


Shaman, Traveler, Oracle: Journal of an Exile of Lasan

by aikisenshi, Findswoman



Series: The Lasan Series [19]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: Diary/Journal, F/M, Gen, Introspection, Lasan, Lasat, Lasat Shamanism, Siege of Lasan, The Force
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-17
Updated: 2020-10-09
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:34:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 30
Words: 29,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25337692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aikisenshi/pseuds/aikisenshi, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Findswoman/pseuds/Findswoman
Summary: A chronicle of the exile, travels, trials, and adventures of a young Lasat shaman (and wife of an Honor Guard captain we all know) following the Imperial invasion of her homeworld and the near-genocide of her people.
Relationships: Garazeb "Zeb" Orrelios/Original Character(s), Original Character(s) & Original Character(s)
Series: The Lasan Series [19]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/967674
Comments: 24
Kudos: 6





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written and posted July 2018–April 2018 as part of the [2018 Dear Diary Challenge](http://boards.theforce.net/threads/dear-diary-challenge-2018-new-year-new-challenge.50047167/) at JCF Fanfic, but new to AO3! The teen rating is for occasional descriptions of violence or its aftereffects (including one that could be taken as attempted sexual assault), though most chapters are in the G range. I will warn accordingly as I post the relevant chapters.
> 
> As always with my Lasan Series stories, you may read more about the underlying fanon lore at [this post](http://boards.theforce.net/posts/54401430) on JCF.
> 
> Some OCs borrowed from the lovely **aikisenshi** appear in later chapters, and part of chapter 22 was written by her; more details will appear on the relevant chapters. Once again I give her my deepest thanks for agreeing to lend her wonderful characters to this project! As always, I am grateful to my good friend **Raissa_Baiard** for beta-reading and for invaluable feedback and support throughout the writing of this.

The sunrise over the cliffs was most magnificent this morning. It was as though all of Lasan’s colors passed before me within the space of half an hour: deep violet to crimson red to ruddy gold, with a tinge of lush green. The guard towers, the cliffs, the spires, the treetops were washed in light as in dew; I could feel its luminous coolness on my face and my footpads as I walked along the trail to Mount Straga. And the view of the transfigured landscape from the funicular car—truly with each dawn Lasan is born anew and births us all anew.

I try to remind myself of this each time I awaken with one of the headaches or cramps: it is merely the same process taking place within, the Ashla working inside me. But they are becoming more frequent of late, and more of them have been bringing me visions. Wise Chava has advised that I continue to keep track of them in this journal, and I try to do so, though I do not always remember them once they have happened. Many are just shadow-images: I am walking through some ruined town, or some barren landscape, that moments later disintegrates into reality; it never lasts long enough for me to be able to tell if they are places I know or not. This morning it was a mountain with its top strangely scorched and blunted; I do not know which mountain, or where. It disappeared, and only searing pain remained.

It is all particularly worrying in light of what G. has said about the mounting tensions with the Empire. It has grown so serious that he has put the Honor Guard on high alert. There are threats of invasion, or worse...

Dearest G.—as if his military duties didn’t already weigh heavily enough upon him, he has managed to be quite the mother avian about these headaches of mine. He insisted that I not go in to the Academy today, that I stay home and rest and finish the pot of blumfruit-queen’s heart tea he made for me. He relented somewhat when I reassured him that transcribing ancient manuscripts and teaching chant to the initiates is not likely to stir up my currents beyond normal parameters; if anything, my Academy work has brought me calm during these tense times. Still, G. has been comming at regular intervals throughout the day to check on me. (I suspect he is concerned about another eventuality, too—though there seems to be little chance of that, given what Yhazi said last season about my predisposition to vision shock.)

But my Zeblove should not fret so much over his wife’s silly ailments, not when the safety of all Lasan is at stake. May the four protecting cloaks of the Ashla be over him and his comrades!

In the meantime I am once again in the funicular car, traveling down Mount Straga as the shadows lengthen over the cliffs. It has been a calm and productive day. I am almost finished with Osthi’s early journals, and the initiates are doing beautifully with the daily rites; in not too long they will be ready to learn the ancient modes. Tomorrow, if all goes well O ASHLA O SOVEREIGN SPIRIT WHAT HAS HAPPENED WHAT IS HAPPENING


	2. Chapter 2

NO!  
  
 _Ai rrhu’khu’ ai karabast’aka,_ no!  
  
The Academy of Shamans—the holy place of the Revered Masters—gone! Destroyed! With nothing but rubble and blackness in its place! How can this be—and yet—O Ashla, gracious Ashla—  
  
The charred, blunted mountain in my vision—it was Mount Straga. It _is_ Mount Straga.  
  
I don’t know how long I have sat here. I don’t know if I have been unconscious or just in shock. All I know is—there was a loud sound, and the roar of starships’ engines, and the mountain shook, and—I remember nothing till I turned to look out the window, up toward the mountaintop…  
  
Meanwhile the upper end of funicular car seems to be mangled, and it is stuck less than halfway down the mountain. How is it that I am safe? Am I safe?  
  
My comm has lost its signal. The last thing there is a message from G.: the invasion has begun. All forces mobilized. LOVE YA DARLIN WHATEVER HAPPENS. Oh, I must find him—  
  
I must find all of them. Mama, Papa. Chornogar, Chornozod. My teachers. Rishla, Yhazi—  
  
But first to get down from here. I have a thought. My staff was in my study chamber at the Academy, of course, but I do still have my stone…


	3. Chapter 3

So much has happened. So much has changed.  
  
So much has been destroyed.  
  
It has all been like some horrible, feverish storm-vision. My currents have been wracked to their utmost, and I can barely believe I am where I am now. But I am, and I see my faithful little journal is still here in my bag—so I shall write everything down, just as Wise Chava advised me. (My dear teacher, thank the Ashla you’re safe! If only I could be with you...)  
  
I see I last wrote from the funicular; it seems ages ago and worlds ago now (that latter is certainly true, at least). With my focusing stone I somehow managed to work up enough of a Journeyer’s Lightning to get the mangled car moving down the slope and guide it into the station at the foot of the mountain. It was more effort than I thought it would be in my agitated state, and even though I knew I had to go and try to find G. and my parents and brothers, I think exhaustion got the better of me. Again, I do not know for how long.  
  
When I awoke, I had to decide whether to head southeastward into Lira Zel to see if I could find G. and Mama, or westward to Flowstone Vale to look for Papa and my brothers. I decided on Flowstone Vale, since it is technically slightly closer, but not before dashing off a quick comm message to G. (probably something like ZEBLOVE WHERE ARE YOU AM SAFE MORE SOON) on the remote chance a signal could somehow get through. Then I ran without stopping down the trail. Oh, how changed it was from the days when he used to walk me home at day’s end, when the wildflowers smiled at us and the purple cliffs silvered over in the twilight! All was black, charred, and barren—the ravaged landscape of my storm-visions...  
  
I reached the cliffs that overlook the town from the south, near the mine. I only needed one glance to see what had happened. Buildings razed, houses torched; I could see my old family home at the end of Maznaberry Lane, burnt almost to the ground. Bodies lying in strange, contorted shapes in the streets and all over the grounds of the mine. The headframes mangled, their cables slashed, the shafts caved in...  
  
Papa, Chorg, and Chorz still underground with all their comrades. O Ashla, how…  
  
And still no signal, no comm response from G.  
  
I ran again, back along the trail toward Lira Zel. I was so desperate and fatigued that I must have stopped at least a few times along the way. It was the same there, of course, only more so, and worse, for this time I wasn’t merely looking down from a cliff. The smell of death hung everywhere. I still do not know why all the bodies I saw lay in those twisted shapes, only that they must have died in horrible pain…  
  
I passed what was left of the Mining Ministry, and my heart heaved in my throat as I saw a heap of the twisted bodies that seemed to have been thrown from the windows. The corner of a black-and-white-checked skirt was peeking out from the center of the pile, and a broken necklace of multicolored quartz lay a little ways off…  
  
Mama.  
  
I picked up her quartz beads and put them in one of my satchel’s inner pockets, next to the one with my focusing stone.  
  
 _Rrhu lir’Ashl’aka,_ how the pain blooms in my head again! I must rest before I write any more. I have a some time, at least; the navcomputer readout is showing eight hours. Hopefully the ruffian will not manage to free himself in that time…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Journeyer’s Lightning: In the _Rebels_ episode “Legends of the Lasat,” Zeb channels mystical energy with his bo-rifle (in what I call “ancient mode”) to move the _Ghost_ through the secret hyperspace pathway to Lira San. “Journeyer’s Lightning” is my fanon name for this technique, and in this case Shulma is performing it on the funicular car she’s stuck in, using the focusing stone from her [Ashla staff](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Ashla_Staff). (Chava keeps her stone separately from her staff in the same episode as well.)  
>   
> “I still do not know why all the bodies I saw lay in those twisted shapes, only that they must have died in horrible pain”: the result of the use of the [T-7 ion disruptor rifle](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/T-7_ion_disruptor_rifle) during the Siege of Lasan, first described in “Droids in Distress.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chava and Gron cameo in this chapter! Also, **content warning** for some **violence** and **attempted sexual assault**.

  
I feel much more rested now. The navcomputer now reads 6.25; I must have been more exhausted than I thought. But I must and shall continue: for my currents, for Lasan—and for you, my lost warrior!  
  
After finding Mama, I checked the comm again; still no signal, and the power cell was close to running out. I ran as fast as I could up Palace Street and did not stop till I reached the Parade Grounds, even as the rubble and grit and broken glass abraded my footpads. By now I knew what I was going to find, though the sight still jarred me to my core. The Royal Palace—jewel of Lasan, stronghold of the Royal Houses for millennia—reduced to a smoldering, corpse-filled ruin. The Royal Parade Grounds a battleground, strewn with the twisted, broken remains of Lasan’s finest warriors. I could tell they had been cruelly outnumbered by the Imperial forces. But they had fought bravely and had held the palace to the end: I could see how many of the invaders they had taken with them. And you, dearest, bravest G., had led them!  
  
I set about looking for you, even as I feared what I might find. I do not know how long I wandered through the carnage and rubble and blood, from one end of the parade grounds to the other, up and down the main courts of the palace, not finding my warrior among the living or the dead. As I walked I chanted the Consecration of the Fallen, and my voice quavered just as my heart did. How strange it felt to be uttering any sound, now that all of Lasan had gone silent. And yet how could I not commend all those departed brave spirits to the one sovereign spirit of the universe? Along the way I remember chalking the glyph of the Honor Guard on one of the ancient, iron-banded doors, and the Lightning of Eternity encircling it—emblem of the One Light that will shine upon them always.  
  
At last I reached the Inner Court. The old, familiar pain rose behind my eyes as I looked around. Yet more of the horribly contorted bodies lay strewn about. I saw among them our brave queen in her full ceremonial armor, still clutching her bo-rifle. And there, floating in the reflecting pool—O dear Ashla!—one of the young princes, maybe the Crown Prince’s elder son? A kit of no more than five dust seasons… Sickness welled up in me and I turned away.  
  
I noticed a broken bo-rifle lying in one corner, an AB-75; I tried to read the name engraved on the grip, but it was too scuffed and obliterated. Then a metallic glint in another corner caught my eye. My head twinged even more keenly as I went over to examine it: it was a standard-issue Honor Guard utility knife, lying atop a pile of broken stone. On the hilt was a design of a rampant konculor with teeth bared, wielding a bo-rifle, and your name engraved below, my love, with the date you took the captaincy… oh, how I kissed that dear blade and pressed it to my heart!  
  
Then I heard voices, or at least sounds. They seemed to come from northward, from the terrace overlooking the lake; I stashed the knife in my satchel and ran out to see what it was. A small ship was docked at the eastern end of the terrace, where the parkland (or what once was parkland) begins. Beside it stood a Guardsman that I recognized as one of G.’s lieutenants—Tarbigron, I think it was, Tarbigron Stultzfoss; he was talking to three Wookiees and was carrying someone in his arms, someone small. A little closer and I could see who it was: Chava! Dear, wise Chava, chief of the Revered Masters and my own beloved teacher! I thanked the Ashla that she was safe, though that I saw that her foot hung limply, as if broken.  
  
She noticed me and pointed in my direction, and Lt. Stultzfoss began to call and beckon to me. I ran over to them, embraced her (though gently, for it turned out that both her feet were broken), and asked if either of them had seen G. The lieutenant said they had not; he told me of how he had found her in the Royal Cabinet of Books, half crushed beneath fallen furniture, and how later the Wookiees had found them. He begged me to go with them to safety, for there was always the chance that the Imperial forces would return to “finish the job,” as he said. It was a tempting offer, though I still did not know what had become of G.—and if there was any chance that he was still alive, still somewhere on the palace grounds, it would be wrong to leave him behind. So I asked if I might first finish my search for him. Chava and Lt. Stultzfoss consulted for a moment with the Wookiees, and Chava translated their reply: yes, but I must hurry, for if the Imperials returned they would not take kindly to finding them there.  
  
I thanked them and ran back to the palace. My heart thudded and my whole body trembled as I made my way back through the wreckage, scanning the carnage for any sign of him. Nothing, nothing—not even the smallest button or clasp or rank pip. I called to him, screaming that beloved name again and again at the top of my lungs. Nothing! Still nothing! And the ache in my head grew and grew…  
  
Suddenly someone grabbed forcefully from behind with a thick, gray-sleeved arm. I struggled and screamed; the arm gripped harder. Hot breath reeked against my cheek. A voice sneered: _what have we here_ and _you’re a fine prize_ and _scream all you want animal woman it’s not like anyone else can hear you._ The barrel of a blaster jabbed me in the small of my back…  
  
I awoke to find myself tied to the bed in the stateroom of this shuttle. I heard the sound of engines powering up, then felt a violent jolt; from that I knew I was on a ship that had entered hyperspace. I struggled to tear myself free. Fortunately it did not take too long, for the cords were not very securely tied (they might hold a Human, but certainly no Lasat more than fourteen dust seasons old). Just as I did so the door slid open, and in walked a large, disgustingly heavy Human in Imperial uniform—my attacker—who immediately threw himself on me, slavering and leering and taunting: _oh look the animal woman has gotten loose feisty aren’t you I bet you’re insatiable._ I struggled under his weight but finally managed to get a grip and lift him from me—then I shoved him against the wall again and again till he fell unconscious. His mouth gaped stupidly as he slumped downward. I doubt he expected his “prize” to put up such a fight! But I am Lasat, and all of us have some of the Warrior in us.  
  
I gagged him with one of the bedsheets, took his pistol, and cuffed him with a pair of stun cuffs he had in one of his pockets. I searched the ship and found a cargo hold—more like a cargo closet—and dumped him in and locked the door. Then I rummaged through his effects and the ship’s records just long enough to find out that he is Moff Smodas Belphagor, governor of the Svivren Sector. For whatever that may be worth. Likely nothing.  
  
I found my satchel lying in a corner of the stateroom. Nothing was missing, thank the Ashla.  
  
So here I am, hurtling through hyperspace in the shuttle of this Moff Belphagor. 4.5 more hours, according to the readout. I think I can hear the ruffian thumping about in the hold. Struggle all you want, you Bogan-spawn! It’s not like anyone else can hear you! At least I am safe and unhurt.  
  
But I did not find you, my warrior—

_[here the ink trails off and bleeds]_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The scene in the Inner Court of the royal palace ties in to two other stories in the Lasan Series, both by Raissa_Baiard, and both not yet posted on AO3. Moff Belphagor is our joint OC.  
>   
> Lt. Tarbigron Stultzfoss: This is meant to be the Gron of “Legends of the Lasat”; he and Chava are the two refugees that the crew of the _Ghost_ rescue from the Imperials. Their rescue by the Wookiees is fanon but based on a remark made by Zeb in “Droids in Distress” (“I owe those hairy beasts—they saved some of my people”). Unfortunately, given what happens to Chava and Gron later, I imagine that these Wookiees were later intercepted by the Empire.  
>   
> Royal Cabinet of Books: In _ancien-régime_ France, the king’s private library was called the Cabinet des Livres du Roy. I’ve adopted the same thing for the Lasat monarchs.


	5. Chapter 5

The navcomputer alarm went off about an hour ago. There was another great jolt, followed by the whine of the hyperdrive shutting down, and it seems I am now in the Svivren system, in orbit around the planet of the same name. And then a comm message came through—someone at docking control in the city of Rills? Whills? Wheels? Something like that; I have always had trouble understanding Human accents. Their _resh_ never quite sounds like a real _resh._  
  
In any case, I was asked to transmit an authorization code. That was a tense few moments indeed, as I had no idea where to find such a thing on a shuttle like this (the last time I had any experience with docking authorization codes was when G. and I borrowed Chorg’s airspeeder for our second trip to Moonflower Springs—which I shall try not to think about now). I managed to stall for a time with a little bit of _no speak good Basic_ in my own accent; try as I might, I couldn’t access the ship’s computer beyond the simplest functions, and I even ran back to the stateroom and rummaged in a few drawers to see if I could at least find a code chip or some such thing. ( _Akh karabast’aka,_ how I wish I had not done that… the candy wrappings and sigarra ends were the least of it!) By that time the docking control agent had become impatient and was threatening to send a shuttle up to board and search mine—and just then I heard a second voice, in the background, cut in with something like, “Diane, what are you _doing?!_ THAT’S THE MOFF’S SHUTTLE!” And so all was resolved, thank the Ashla, and they granted me docking clearance.  
  
So, in about three quarters of an hour, I should be above the spaceport of this Rils or Whills, and I have been thinking about what to do once I am on the ground. Well, first things first: I shall have to take care of that creep Belphagor—namely, get him as far away from me as possible. At least I am armed now: I have his pistol (and have found the locker with the spare power cells) and my husband’s knife, so he is effectively at my mercy. (Not that I would like him there for long.)  
  
After that? I don’t know. I suppose I should begin by considering what I have here with me. First, there’s all the moff’s effects, though except for the pistol and power cells I intend to dispose of most of them along with him. Next time I stun him I suppose I should see if he has a credit stick; that might be useful to have.  
  
Then there is my faithful satchel, containing the only possessions left to me in the Galaxy beyond the clothing that covers me. I may as well list them here, just to pass the time:

  1. This journal.
  2. This stylus, which will soon need a new ink cartridge.
  3. A few books: the abridged chant compendium from which I had been teaching the initiates, Maimonios’s exegesis on the Fourth through Sixth Tractates of Prophecy, and my copy of Chava’s Lasan-Straga edition of Osthi’s _Stronghold of Prophecy,_ which she inscribed to me the day I rose to the First Degree.
  4. G.’s captaincy holo as a placeholder in the Osthi.
  5. My datapad, which is no longer receiving any kind of comm signal, even though I am out of hyperspace. I shall probably need to replace the network identification chip once I land.
  6. A tin of Shaman Rachtilios’s headache pastilles, with only three left.
  7. Two pads, which were three until about an hour ago. (Well, there is our answer yet again, Zeblove—though now it comes more as a relief than anything else.)
  8. Most of a pouchful of ritual chalk.
  9. An entire pouchful of hairpins.
  10. The pistol and a few spare power cells, as mentioned before.
  11. Mama’s beads.
  12. My focusing stone.
  13. G.’s knife.



And then there is this shuttle. That will require some thought. Part of me wonders if it would be useful to have a ship at my disposal. Once I dispose of the Human, I could return to Lasan and resume my search for you, dearest… and there indeed are the coordinates, still in the navcomputer buffer…  
  
But no. It would be too great a risk. I now have seen what G. has always told me: the Empire is ruthless, merciless, uncompromising. The longer I keep the shuttle, the greater their chance of tracing it to me, and if they do, they will certainly send ships to intercept. And even if I somehow made it back to Lasan—would G. even be there? Supposing he were, supposing I found him—wouldn’t I be putting him in danger as well? I can only hope and pray that Wise Ch. and Lt. S. and the Wookiees (may the Ashla be their shield) have managed to find him themselves… though I barely have hope even of that anymore.  
  
Oh, they must think I am dead! How I wish I had gone with them when I had had the chance! Though I know why I didn’t—or do I?  
  
No, again no! This is not the time to stir up my currents about what I _could have done_ (especially with only three headache pastilles left). What I have done I have done, where I am I am, and I can only hope that it will be for a reason. The fact is that I am far from home, in exile, and likely to remain so.  
  
Exile: the word wounds. And yet—in her eighth prophecy, Osthi writes of the Seer going into exile for love of the Child. If that blessed and holy avatar can endure such a thing, so can humble Shulma.  
  
Fifteen minutes till docking, now. And I hear my _friend_ in the cargo hold kicking up a racket again. Time for another stun, methinks…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Rils? Whills? Wheels?”: The city Shulma is about to dock in is [Wrils](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Wrils), capital city of the southern district of [Svivren](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Svivren).  
>   
> “Their _resh_ never quite sounds like a real _resh_ ”: See the note about rolled _r_ s at <http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Lasat_(language)>.


	6. Chapter 6

Well, there is no doubt about it: I am stuck here on the strange, dingy little world they call Svivren until further notice. It has been a little over a week since that horrid officer’s shuttle landed me here; my first move, of course, was to deposit his repulsive, unconscious bulk in some faraway dark alley where he could not find me again. (Did he really think he could subdue me? We are not wispy and fragile like Human women, who are likely to snap in half as soon a gentle breeze blows. Really, his whole attempt would have been almost amusing if it hadn’t been so horrible at the same time.)  
  
What a strange change! I always used to hear from Papa and my brothers about what a delicate little thing I was, but now that I see what Human and near-Human females look like… add to that the fact that I am taller even than many of the males I have seen here and have have hit my head on several lintels already…  
  
At least I’ve now “dealt with him” (as G. used to say), so now I can turn my full attention to finding my place in this sprawling city of Wrils. That is its name, I found out, though as expected most of the Humans and Near-Humans here pronounce much more of the _wesk_ than the _resh._ It is the capital of this planet’s southern landmass, and I am of course in its spaceport district. Hence the sprawl, I suppose.  
  
At least there does not seem to be a significant Imperial presence here. There is an Imperial garrison on-planet, but it is located well outside the city, and it seems that Moff Belphagor does not actually reside on Svivren itself but in the neighboring Bront System. So why was his course laid in to this world? I frankly don’t care to speculate.  
  
There apparently is also some kind of planetwide restriction on the possession of weapons, though after all that has happened I do not want to be without a way to defend myself. I simply keep the pistol and its power cells stashed deep in my satchel. Beyond one final stun for the dear moff, I have thankfully not had to use it yet.  
  
It is odd to be so far away from the homeworld. Odd, and wrong. And yet: would it not be odd and wrong to be there again, now that those plasteel savages have ravaged it beyond recognition? Now that there is nothing and no one there? (Now that you, my dearest G., are forever gone…? For I am almost sure of that now… )  
  
And that is why I sold the shuttle after all—as much as it broke my heart to deprive myself of my only means of returning. There are several speeder and starship dealers in this part of Wrils; after visiting some and getting a few quotes, I finally offered the shuttle to a very friendly older Bimm couple with a dealership near the refueling depot. They gave me 9,000 for it—not bad, I suppose, though I lack the expertise to know. Naturally, I first made sure to clear all the repugnant personal effects out of the lockers, cabinets, and drawers and dispose of them (in a different faraway dark alley from the moff himself).  
  
Somehow I have managed to find a room to rent: small, drafty, but comfortable, and reasonably quiet. It is in one of the quieter commercial streets, above a row of shops: a stationer, a wigmaker, a greengrocer, a seamstress. All well and good—though by now I have run through almost all the funds on the credit stick from the ruffian’s pocket. And if I keep it too long, it will certainly be traced to me… I will need to find some kind of gainful work, and that right soon. The city’s public computer terminals seem to show some employment listings; I shall have to take a closer look at those.  
  
But one of the shops downstairs has given me an idea that I wish it had not. (Forgive me, my absent love!)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Parts of this chapter/entry also appear (or, more accurately, appeared previously) in my story [Three Strands](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20930357).
> 
> “Imperial garrison on-planet,” “planetwide restriction on the possession of weapons”: Both established for Svivren in Legends lore; see <http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Svivren>.  
>   
> Bimms: <http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Bimm>  
>   
> Bront System (also in Svivren Sector): <http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Bront_system>


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter and the next are structured as a series of several shorter journal entries written over a period of time.

I am not so sure about this idea of mine now. It seems too desperate; should I be going to such extremes? Besides, it would only be temporary. I would much prefer to find some kind of more stable situation for the long term.  
  
So I have been combing the employment listings on the city computer terminals, though so far it has been somewhat of a disappointment. Almost all the positions advertised seem to be at the Imperial garrison outside town—which I suppose should not surprise me. That, of course, is one recourse I shall never take no matter how indigent I become; this “animal woman” has her pride! Clothing shop sales assistant? Perhaps, though I wonder if the clothing shop (it is not too far from here, just under five kilometers or so) would want a sales assistant who could not fit into anything they sell. Bookkeeper’s assistant? Now, that one gave me a wistful smile: that had been Mama’s first job at the mining ministry long ago. But I never inherited her flair for figures… I’ll have to think that one over.  
  
I shall keep looking. What else can I do?

* * *

Even here, I shall take Wise Chava’s advice and record all the times the Ashla brings me visions. This morning, I dreamed G. was lying beside me. He reached over to pull me close, as he always used to do, and his warm green eyes smiled as he leaned down to kiss me…  
  
And then I awoke and found myself cold and alone, and now my head is filled with piercing pain. Perhaps it is time to try a few of those pharma tablets from the apothecary shop on Cresh Street.

* * *

The pharma tablets did nothing. Indeed, they only made me dizzy and disoriented as well. I should have known nothing sold here would be formulated for a Lasat. So now I am down to two of Shaman Rachtilios’s pastilles. May the Four Protecting Cloaks be upon me!  
  
I wish I could recall what she used to put in them; perhaps I could try my hand at making some more. But the healing arts were always more Yhazi’s area than mine. (Ah, Yhazi, what I wouldn’t give to hear your laughter again…)

* * *

I looked again at the employment listings on the city terminal. There is a new opening for a server at a diner on the east side of town—a place on Herf Street called the Old-School. I shall enquire there tomorrow.

* * *

I went to the Old-School this morning. It is a small, no-nonsense place, but full of warm, delicious smells, and it is a popular lunch spot with the workers at the factories nearby. My interview with the manager proceeded smoothly until she saw my feet. No, I am not being facetious: I was told in no uncertain terms that all employees are required to wear shoes or some other kind of foot covering while on the job. Where does she think I am going to find shoes that fit? And even if I did— _rrhu’karabast’aka,_ the very thought of _covering my feet!_ A Lasat’s feet are her pride, and pride is all I have left these days.  
  
I bristled inside, but I thanked the manager for her time and left. At least I did not leave empty-handed: they were kind enough to offer all their job applicants a free meal, so I came home with a fragrant takeout bag of bantha kidney pie. It was really quite good.  
  
Well, back to the terminal, then. I recall that it gave the address and comm number of an employment agency that might have more offerings; perhaps they can be of help.

* * *

Arrived at the agency this morning. It was a fairly quick procedure: I had to fill out one of their dataforms, and they promise a reply within two business rotations. (I did manage to replace my datapad’s network identification chip, and I rented one of those communications boxes at the spaceport complex—just the smallest-sized one.) A bit humbling too, however: their list of areas of training makes me realize just how little vocational experience I really have. (“Ashla talent” and “expert knowledge of ancient Lasat spiritual and prophetic literature” are not exactly marketable skills in this part of the Outer Rim.)  
  
I left “species” blank, just to be safe.

* * *

It has been four days now with no word from the agency. My funds are beginning to run low. The headaches have been returning. If I can, I’d like to conserve my two remaining pastilles; the spikemint tea I found in the pantry seems all right so far, though it is nothing like the queen’s heart-blumfruit tea G. used to make me.  
  
Maybe I should reconsider my earlier idea, at least as a stopgap...

* * *

Success! I found a nice, sharp pair of shears in one of the kitchen drawers. They should do the trick. May the Ashla guide my hands! G., my hotheaded love, would you be angry with me for what I am about to do?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cresh Street, Herf Street: The names of these streets are Aurebesh letters, à la the [lettered streets in Washington, D.C.](https://ggwash.org/view/2530/washingtons-systemic-streets)  
>   
> The Old-School is a nod to [the Old Fashioned](http://www.theoldfashioned.com/) in downtown Madison, Wisconsin.  
>   
> Yhazi: An OC, one of Shulma’s friends and fellow shamans. She is also in [Calm after the Storm](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15844134) and [Light of Lasan](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20930813). She and Shaman Rachtilios are not the same person, incidentally.  
>   
> The last line of this chapter is also part of [Three Strands](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20930357).  
>   
> And [Pharma](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Pharma) is perhaps the most boring possible name for a GFFA analgesic that I know. :P


	8. Chapter 8

It’s done. My head feels strangely light now. And I have 4500 more credits than I did before. That is something, at least, until the agency decides to come through with something (but I am not holding my breath about that). I have a credit stick of my own now; the old one lies in tiny shreds at the bottom of this city’s trash compaction system. Should I feel relieved, contented, at peace?  
  
I ask because I do not.  
  
I still hear the snick of the shears carrying out their inexorable duty. Not just my hair has been cut: have not the blades of the Ashla sliced me loose from all I have ever loved and lived for? Without homeworld and kin, aren’t I too nothing but a dead bundle of filaments and wisps, to be bought and sold and perhaps remade? _Ai rrhu’karabast’aka,_ what has become of me, what _will_ become of me?!  
  
But even now, on the floor of my cold room, your worn, dog-eared holoimage lies before me: you, my warrior, in all your military glory, hefting the ancient weapon of honor. And my tears fall, hot and caustic, on the image of your eyes.

* * *

I took a long walk today, both to run a few errands at the market and to get to know this part of town better. It was overcast all day, with rain looming though never quite breaking, and by the time I made my way home a most magnificent petrichor hung in the air. It reminded me of the air on Mount Straga before the summer storms—and yes, I used to complain about the headaches that so often plagued me under those conditions, but today I simply stood in the middle of the square and inhaled it deeply: the smell of my home, far away from home.  
  
(One thing now missing, of course, is the feeling of the stormbreeze blowing through my hair. I am still not fully used to being having it so short.)  
  
And then the sun peeked through the cloud cover, and the sublime scent was gone. Just as well, perhaps; a public square is not the best place for a level-three vision trance. But as soon as I got back, I took out Chava’s edition of Osthi and reread her sixth contemplation: “O ether of the storm, O attar of the holy mountain, let all other scents be subsumed in you!” What a miracle that even here in exile I have this holy seer’s lovely words beside me.

* * *

I finally heard from the agency. They commed me yesterday—with the very same bookkeeper’s assistant listing I saw last week on the city terminal! Well, fine, then. I have set up an appointment for a placement test on Centaxday after next, but I do not fancy my chances.  
  
Rereading Osthi the other day gave me a thought. Those words that I wrote in this journal are here beside me in Chava’s volume, but so much of my people’s ancient writings are now lost, and I don’t know where I would be able to find them short of the ancient homeworld itself. All that is left of them, at least here, is the bits and pieces of them I have in my memory. But if I wrote down those bits and pieces, just as I wrote down that sentence from Osthi, then perhaps at least some of the ancient lore would be preserved, which is better by far than none of it at all. I shall need to plan this out further, but it seems worth a try.

* * *

I interviewed for the bookkeeping position today, and it went essentially as expected. Well, better, in a way: I scored just below the cutoff point on the placement test rather than all the way in the lowest bracket, which is what I had actually _expected._ But it still was enough to eliminate me. No surprise, really.  
  
And then, just as I was returning to the apartment, I saw the Drabatan lady who owns the seamstress shop putting up a sign in her window. I watched for a moment to see what it said: it was “Help Wanted—Willing to Train—Inquire Within.” I thought on it for a few moments: I am by no means an expert at sewing, but long ago Mama showed me a few things about mending my dresses and cloaks, and I used to help Shaman Movshati with the shrine hangings from time to time, so I figured perhaps I had a chance.  
  
As I was standing there thinking, the Drabatan lady noticed me and waved at me (as she sometimes does when we see each other near the building close to opening time or closing time), and I waved back. Just then I thought I could feel a faint _spark_ or _ping_ within me—the same feeling Wise Chava once told me was the spark of the Ashla when it looks with favor upon one and urges one toward a course of action. It was the same feeling I used to get after an exam or ritual well done, and I realized just then that I had not felt it or anything like it since I left Lasan, let alone in any of my other attempts at finding employment.  
  
So I went in. Her first words as I entered and lowered my hood (I almost always wear my hood when going out): “Oh! You Lasat!” My heart jumped into my throat for a moment as she quickly lowered the window shades, but I calmed when she said she had heard of what the Empire had done to Lasan and marveled that I had managed to survive. I choked back tears; it was the first time since I came to Wrils that anyone had recognized my origins and expressed sympathy for what had happened to my homeworld. But this was a job interview, after all, so I swallowed my emotion and answered her questions about my experience with sewing, what kind of sewing machines I had used before, whether I had ever worked with a tailor droid, and so forth. Even with her sympathetic manner, I tried to be as vague as possible about my (very meager) past experience on Lasan, simply because one never knows. Fortunately she seemed to understand.  
  
She then took me to one of the sewing machines at the back of the shop, gave me a large piece of drapery fabric, and asked me to hem it for curtains. The machine took some getting used to—it was much lighter than Mama’s old treadle-operated NaNiBer and I feared I would pull it over at any moment; it didn’t help that the fabric was heavy and unwieldy as well. But as I worked I noticed that little twinkling _spark_ again—the Ashla is truly everywhere and in all things! All the while the seamstress was right beside me with aid and encouragement: “little that WAY, now other WAY, STEADY now, you doing fine.” (Occasionally she would say some words much louder than others; a Drabatan speech pattern, perhaps? Or just her own?)  
  
And I think I must have done fine in the end, because I start first thing tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> petrichor: An honest-to-goodness RL word for the smell of rain. See, for example, [this article](https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-44904298) on what causes it.  
>   
> Chava’s edition of Osthi: First mentioned in Shulma's inventory in [entry 5](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25337692/chapters/62049760).  
>   
> Drabatan: <http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Drabatan>. This is the species to which [Pao](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Paodok%27Draba%27Takat) of _Rogue One_ belongs. Incidentally, hold that thought…  
>   
> “A Drabatan speech pattern, perhaps?”: Yes, or at least that’s my interpretation based on the [Wook article on the Drabatese language](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Drabatese); it seems that volume might have semantic import in Drabatese the way tones do in tone languages like Thai and Chinese.  
>   
> NaNiBer: A not very creative takeoff on [Bernina](http://www.bernina.com/).


	9. Chapter 9

I have been working at the seamstress’s shop for three Standard weeks now. Lua is her name, or in full, Lualani’Draba’Takiil (I am sure of that spelling only from her business chip). She is a kindly sort, and has been very patient in answering my foolish questions about how to do certain alterations, how to operate the machines, which settings and needle sizes to use for which fabric types, and so forth. Thanks to her help, I feel much more secure with the machines, and I have even had the help of her old tailoring droid, PR-L4, for the more difficult alterations. I still sometimes feel the ping of the Ashla inside me as I sit at my work, even when I am shaky—especially when I am shaky.  
  
We get a good stream of work, regular but not overwhelming. Most of it is basic alterations: cuffs to be hemmed, buttons to be reattached, waistlines to be let out or taken in (usually the former). Very occasionally a custom clothing order will come in—a dress or a suit for some special occasion like a ceremony or ball—though it is mainly Lua who handles those.   
  
Lua paid me my first wage a week ago. She said she was very pleased with my work so far, and she even made a pleasantly surprising proposal: that she pay me from time to time in clothing made to fit me. (“Because I bet it NO EASY find dresses your SIZE”—well, yes, I know I am a little larger than most other beings in this city…) Of course I accepted. She said she would measure me when I came in to work on Primeday, and she promised to have a dress and coat ready for me by the end of the month. It is a rather luxurious prospect, really—the only other custom-made clothing I have ever owned was my wedding gown and cloak.  
  
Meanwhile, I have been devoting time each evening to writing down everything I can remember of the writings of the ancients. These last weeks I have been concentrating on the first two Tractates of Prophecy. So far I have almost filled two standard-sized business notebooks from the stationer’s shop, but it has been difficult and tiring work, and I fear I have forgotten much. I suppose I should have gone out of order and started with the fourth through sixth Tractates, since those are the subject of the one Maimonios volume I still have. But of course Osthi’s _Stronghold_ is replete with references and citations from all the Tractates (all thoroughly explained in Chava’s detailed notes), so I at least can turn there if I need my memory refreshed. All in all, it is a little like studying for the First Degree exam all over again, only with many fewer books at my disposal, and no study meetings in the Academy reading room with Rishla and Yhazi. Sometimes I see them sitting across from me at my rickety little table, with books open in front of them, just as in the olden days, and I almost expect one of them to start quizzing me…  
  
And then it all disappears, of course, and I’m left to go about my work all alone in my drafty room—sometimes with a dull headache. The texts feel very long then, very long and very tedious. But then suddenly my memory will spark with some sublime passage that makes all the tedium worthwhile: last night it was that lovely section in 2–36, I think it was, about the cliff thrush that sings its most beautiful song before its fallen nest and broken eggs. (A favorite text of Osthi’s too, expanded upon in her seventh contemplation.) Perhaps I too can be like that thrush, and sing even though all that is mine has been destroyed… at any rate, I always try to make it to the end of a chapter, or of a major section at the very least, before I turn in.  
  
Which I think I shall do now, after a cup of the spikemint tea. It has been a long three weeks—good, but long. _Darkness, sweet darkness, soother of the weary…_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lualani’Draba’Takiil: An OC. Her name is a combination of the Haitian Creole word _lwa_ or _loa_ (the word for the principal spirits or deities in Haitian Vodou), and Hawaiian _lani_ (flower).  
>   
> PR-L4: Named after Perla, the female mouse in pink/purple from Disney’s _Cinderella_ (1950), one of the mice who helps sew Cinderella’s dress.  
>   
> Osthi, Maimonios: Authors of two of the books mentioned above in [entry 5](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25337692/chapters/62049760), when Shulma inventories what she still has left in her satchel. Maimonios is of course a not very creative takeoff on [Maimonides](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maimonides), a prominent Jewish theologian and exegete of the 12th century. (Maybe the _-ios_ suffix in Lasat means the same thing as the _-ides_ suffix in Greek.)  
>   
> Rishla, Yhazi: OCs; Shulma’s friends and fellow shamans who appeared previously in [Calm After the Storm](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15844134) and [Light of Lasan](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20930813).


	10. Chapter 10

This evening, after closing time, Lua surprised me with an invitation to tea with her in her apartment (which is directly behind her shop and directly below my apartment, though a good deal larger). I accepted with pleasure, of course. As soon as our tea was poured and we were seated on the sofa, she asked me how it was that I escaped from Lasan and ended up on Svivren. The question took me somewhat by surprise—though I suppose it shouldn’t have. In any case, Lua noticed my hesitancy: “That okay,” she said, “I understand, I SHARE first, then see how you FEEL.”  
  
Then she told me of the seizure of her own homeworld, Pipada, by the Empire: how her people had revolted, forming a resistance movement spearheaded by the celebrated singer Sa’Kalla. There had been a few victories, but too few: the Empire finally established martial law on Pipada, and Lua was one of many who had been forced to close her business and flee as a result. I felt tears rising as I listened; here beside me on this faraway world was someone else who had been displaced from her home by the Empire’s evil actions, and someone who trusted me enough to confide in me. Here too Lua must have noticed my emotion, for she laid her leathery, gray-green hand on mine and said, “You no CRY, child. See, you not alone. YOU NOT ALONE.” _Child,_ just as Wise Chava used to call me! I had to take a hasty swallow of tea to keep myself from really dissolving in tears.  
  
Lua took me over to a nearby shelf where a holoimage was sitting. It showed another Drabatan, younger, whose complexion was dark gray rather than gray-green. “That my boy,” she said, then something lengthy and chattery that must have been his name but sounded to me like “Padakrabatakah.” He was still on Pipada, she told me, still working for the Sa’Kalla resistance movement, but she said he often wished there were more he could do to combat the Empire and keep it from doing to other worlds what it had done to his own. Silently I prayed for the Ashla’s protection upon him and the others in his movement, and thought to myself: how different things might have been if a resistance movement like that had been able to form on Lasan! It might have—no, I am certain it _would_ have, if everything hadn’t been so swiftly and so utterly destroyed…  
  
After that, I held nothing back from her. I told her everything—from my experiences after the Empire’s takeover, to my abduction, to my journey to Svivren. She listened intently and with sympathy, and was patient with me whenever my emotion got the better of me. When I told her how I had incapacitated the moff and thrown him in the alley, she gasped in awe—“Oh! _You_ do that! Brave Lasat!”—and even clasped my hand and thanked me. Apparently it had been quite a sensation on the local holonet news: the moff had awakened in an alleyway with numerous bruises, a cracked rib, and severe amnesia, and had to be rushed back to the medcenter on Bront. I had had no idea about this before and asked Lua if there was any chance the investigations might lead back to me; she reassured me that I probably didn’t need to worry, given how incompetent the local Imperial government is. That was a relief to hear, and it gladdens me that that depraved ruffian won’t be making any more trouble for me, or for anyone else in Wrils, anytime soon. (“We NO like him here,” Lua says. “He SICK.”)  
  
I am still thinking about our conversation as I sit here with the notebook in front of me, preparing to take my first notes on the Third Tractate. Lua’s son must be such a brave soul, doing so much to fight the Empire and win his people’s freedom—oh, how proud G. would be of him!—and yet Lua says he wishes he could do more. _Lir’Ashla’ka,_ he is already giving his all! What more could he possibly do?  
  
And here _I_ am, in contrast, sitting at a table with a notebook, straining to remember old, forgotten words from centuries ago—when planets are being conquered and ravaged! What would G. think of me? O Lasan, O lovely homeworld now dead, have I failed you...?  
  
_No, Shulma, you have not—and I am not dead. My wisdom and honor live on in each old, forgotten word you write in that notebook, and my heart beats within yours as long as you live to tell my story. You need not be a warrior to fight. You_ are _fighting for me, and you_ are _resisting—resisting those who would want all memory of me, of us, eradicated from the Galaxy. So: keep writing, dear shaman, keep chanting, keep remembering. Thanks to you, my story is not over._  
  
It is true. We are not all the Warrior: we are sometimes Fools, sometimes Children—sometimes Seers. And the Ashla calls upon us all, at different times and in different ways.  
  
Time to get to work on that Third Tractate, then!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pipada is the homeworld of the Drabatan species (<http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Pipada>). The Empire’s seizure of Pipada, and the [Sa’Kalla resistance movement](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Sa%27Kalla_\(movement\)) that rose in response, are established in the [_Dawn of Rebellion_](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Dawn_of_Rebellion) RPG sourcebook (Fantasy Flight Games, 2018). “Sa’Kalla!” is also Pao’s battle cry in _Rogue One._  
>   
>  Bront System (also in the Svivren Sector): <http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Bront_system>  
>   
> “Padakrabatakah”: None other than [Paodok’Draba’Takat (Pao)](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Paodok%27Draba%27Takat) of _Rogue One._ Lua is his mother (though, again, she is an OC). For a story with both of them, see [The Drabatan Lady Downstairs](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24352663). The identity of the nameless upstairs neighbor mentioned in that story may now be clear...


	11. Chapter 11

Today marks a full year since I arrived in Wrils. I came here as a fugitive, an escaped captive, fearful for my life and safety, with nothing but the contents of my satchel and the clothing that covered me. Since then, by the Ashla’s good graces, I have managed to settle into a calmer existence. I have a place to live and a place to work. I have a caring friend and employer in Lua, who still invites me for tea on Zhellday evenings after closing time. (She has even been trying to teach me how to play galactic tiles, but doubts I am quite ready to join the exuberant group of friends she has over to play on Taungsday evenings. Ah, well, I think I shall live!) I no longer have only the clothing that came with me from Lasan: besides my regular wages, Lua has paid me with two very fine everyday dresses and a lovely hooded cloak, and she has promised a heavier coat for when the weather cools off. She is truly skilled in her art, and her friendship is a bright light in my exile.  
  
My hair is growing back. It comes just to my chin now—enough to catch the breeze on a brisk spring evening.  
  
I still spend most evenings after work writing down all I can of the sacred texts. I shall soon need some new notebooks from the stationer’s; I am now more than halfway through the Fourth Tractate, and just for thrills I have started on some of the Lesser Seers as well. (I always liked the _Flowing Lightnings_ of Berura, and she was one of Osthi’s primary influences too, of course.) I have even finally constructed a new staff housing for my focusing stone—I simply liberated a good, hardwood handle from one of the mops in the broom closet—so I can perform the morning and evening rituals in their full form, and perhaps the seasonal rituals too when the time comes. (I replaced the mop, of course. It was becoming rather moth-eaten anyway.)  
  
So yes, things are going well for me here, it seems. And yet I cannot rid myself of the feeling that I cannot and will not stay here forever…  
  
The visions have been coming to me more and more often, and more intensely. I do not understand why it is happening now, and it is more than a little disturbing. I have seen G. several times now: sometimes beside me in bed, sometimes standing before me while I am sitting at the table, a few times even in the shop—and every time he draws close as if to kiss me, then disappears. Sometimes I see shadowy forms of those I used to know, standing around my work table: Papa and Mama and Chorg and Chorz, or Rishla and Yhazi and Chukwu and the other shamans of my class, or G.’s men, or some of the Revered Masters who taught me, like Shamans Movshati and Rokseth: they stand very still around me in an arc and stare at me, then fade slowly away. I have to wonder why the Ashla has seen fit to add to my misery by continually showing me those I know must now be gone—particularly when things are going so well for me otherwise. (Oddly, I have never seen G. or Wise Ch. in such shadowy form. Whenever my Zeblove appears to me, I see him as clearly as if he were there in the flesh. In a way that makes it all the worse.)  
  
Just yesterday I saw something unlike anything I have before. I was in the middle of working on the buttonhole of a Pantoran gentleman’s overcoat when two bright golden orbs or spheres flared up in my vision. I thought at first they resembled the descriptions in Osthi and the later Tractates of Prophecy of Lira San and its sun, but they were different: the ancient homeworld and its sun differ in brightness, while both of these orbs were equally bright. Also, they seemed more _faceted_ than would be expected of a planet or star, like a rockfly’s compound eyes…  
  
At any rate, they grew larger and larger, brighter and brighter, and as they did my head filled with blinding pain—until at last there was a large, loud crackle of lightning—and I was doubled over on the work table in agony, with the overcoat hanging partly on the floor. I think I was unconscious.  
  
In any case, Lua found me a little while later, weeping and clutching my head, and she insisted that I go drink some hot tea while she finished the buttonhole herself. She was kind about it, but I think she must have been as perplexed as I was (and still am). Thankfully no damage was done, but it was frightening to have such a thing happen on the job. I do not want my silly moments of weakness to interfere with my work or, worse yet, cause me to ruin a customer’s garment.  
  
I have another headache this morning—a bladelike pain right above my eyes, with an aura of bright, colorful specks that dazzles and blurs my vision. The spikemint tea has had no effect, and of course there are no more of Shaman R.’s pastilles. Part of me is sorely tempted to call in sick. But I have never missed a day of work at Lua’s before; should I really let my foolish infirmities keep me from doing what I have promised to do for her? Wouldn’t that be selfish and thankless after all of her generosity toward me? Besides, I do need to pay my rent…  
  
I can just hear dear G. now, saying the same thing he said that very morning that seems so long ago now: _You’re not goin’ anywhere today! You just stay right there in bed and drink all your tea, you got that?!_ Oh, and now I can see him before me, brow knit, arms crossed in that Honor Guard Captain way—oh, my head!—  
  
No. I can’t let my currents engulf me like this now. I must have my breakfast and get my things together to go in to the shop. I think I shall bring this journal too; perhaps the visions have been affecting me so strongly because I have been remiss in writing them down as they happen, as Wise Ch. advised (also so long ago now). Quickly, briefly, and be done with it. Because they are just visions, just shadows, and it’s no use dwelling on what is gone—is it? (Is it, sweet Zeblove? Is it no use that each night I kiss your image and run my finger-pads over the blade that once hung from your belt…?)  
  
0655\. Time to go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Galactic tiles](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Galactic_Tiles) seems to be a GFFA equivalent of mahjong (it was apparently invented by a Duros named M’a Jong). The Wookieepedia link shows it as an arcade game, but I imagine there being an actual tile-based game on which the arcade game is based, and that is what Lua and her friends play, of course.  
>   
> Berura, _Flowing Lightnings:_ More fanon Lasat shamanic lore, like Osthi and the Tractates of Prophecy.


	12. Chapter 12

Mama, while hemming a skirt. She was the one who showed me how, long ago.  
  
Golden spheres again. What are they? Eyes? Jewels?  
  
G.’s hands on my shoulders, just like when he would come up behind me when meeting me at the foot of Mount Straga. I could almost feel them…  
  
Shaman Movshati, standing beside PR-L4 and watching me at work on another buttonhole. The Ashla seems to have a particular fondness for buttonholes.  
  
Wise Chava, standing beside the table and nodding while I was writing down all I could about the sixth through eighth chapters of the Fourth Tractate. I still do not understand why she appears as clearly as G. does. She was my beloved mentor, true, but then why wouldn’t Mama appear the same way? Or my best friends from the academy? All the same, I wonder…  
  
Mama, Papa, and brothers at the table at breakfast.  
  
Then G., looking hungry.  
  
G. again.  
  
Chava, along with Shamans Movshati, Rokseth, and Rachtilios. It was like my First Degree committee all over again.  
  
Wise Chava again.  
  
Rishla and Yhazi, at the table with their books.  
  
Golden spheres at evening rituals.  
  
G.’s hands on my shoulder. Gone as soon as I turned around, of course.  
  
Chava again, during morning rituals.  
  
 _[Similar entries fill many more pages in the journal, reaching almost but not quite to the end.]_  
  
The golden spheres, while mending gloves for the Ardennian knitting shop owner who plays galactic tiles with Lua. Almost blinding. I had to turn off the machine and blink for a bit. Lua did not see.  
  
G. beside me while I was trying on the new dress from Lua.  
  
Lua had a visitor yesterday evening. I can always tell when she has visitors, because her voice is so loud (on Taungsday nights I can barely fall asleep before 2300 courtesy of the galactic tiles ladies). But this one had the same strange quirk of speaking SOME words LOUDER THAN others—another Drabatan? Also, maybe younger? I wonder if it was her son. They talked late into the night.  
  
It was her son. She says he visited her last night but had to leave very early in the morning. Ashla guide him wherever he may be going. (Soon after she told me this I saw G. again, smiling a smile that outshone the sun...)  
  
Golden spheres while eating my lunch. Again, almost blinding.  
  
And again, while loading the last of the dark gray buttonhole thread into PR-L4.  
  
Went walking in the park in the evening after work; suddenly the landscape changed and looked like the cliffs outside Flowstone Vale, where G. and I used to walk in the twilight.  
  
G. again, as I climbed into bed. Oh, darling, if only…  
  
Again the golden spheres! They blazed at me so fiercely that I almost ran the sewing machine over my fingers (another buttonhole). PR rolled up and shut it off just in time. This has to stop or I really will ruin something.  
  
Awoke in middle of the night with piercing headache, nausea, bright golden auras. G. beside me as I awoke, leaning over to kiss me—then all dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shulma is right about the Lua's visitor; see [The Drabatan Lady Downstairs](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24352663).


	13. Chapter 13

The Bogan take those golden spheres! Why have they been haunting my visions for so long?! I have been enduring it because I must—the Ashla sends me what it sends me—but this time it is too much! Today they caused me to drop the vibrocutter so that it first cut my finger, making me bleed all over the fabric, then fell on the fabric and slashed through it—ruining a whole meter! I hoped Lua wouldn’t hear my cry of pain, but she did and immediately came running over. She sighed and tutted when she saw what had happened, gave me a bacta pad from the medkit, and sent me to help PR wind bobbins. She simply got out a new length of fabric and started cutting out the pattern again, but I felt miserable for having wasted her time and material like that. (I apologized to her later. Her response: “No worries, it ALL RIGHT, but try NO do that AGAIN, okay?”)  
  
Again I ask: why? What are they? Why are my visions these days _only_ the golden spheres—and G.? It is not that I haven’t seen them before now, and of course I am used to visions. But as I look back through this journal at the visions I’ve recorded in the time since I arrived (and work with Lua has kept me so busy and so tired that I haven’t had much time to record anything else), I see that there was a time when the Ashla sent me images of many beings and things: my parents, my brothers, my friends, my teachers, places I remembered from Lasan. Only now, in the last few months, there has been no Chava, no shamans, no family members, no homeworld—nothing but strange, blazing golden spheres and the occasional Zeblove. Why? What does it mean? It must mean something—everything means something…  
  
I must think on it further. If I were back at the Academy, I would go to the library and consult the ancient sources that deal with visions and prophecies. I only have a few books of my own now—but I do have all those notes of mine, and, as Rossalmus the Scribe writes, the Ashla often rewards study with insight…

* * *

Awoke to the golden spheres. Saw them very close: they really do look like faceted jewels. Rather pretty when they’re not interrupting my work.  
  
G. at breakfast, though he looked angry. I’m sorry I ate all the mealgrain, dearest…?  
  
Golden spheres again, momentarily, while I was writing down a customer’s order (involving, incidentally, buttonholes). I blinked a bit, but she would not have noticed.

* * *

I have spent the last several days looking back through my notes hoping to gain some kind of insight into these visions of mine and perhaps even some respite from them. There is differing opinion among the ancient sages concerning recurring visions, both within the Tractates of Prophecy themselves and among the later seers and exegetes. One of the most widespread interpretations is that such visions represent one’s heart’s deepest desire—well, that would certainly explain G. (even if that desire is no longer attainable), but what about the spheres? If they were the ancient homeworld and its sun, it would make more sense; I know that Svivren is not truly a _home_ to me. But I really do not understand why I would so greatly desire a pair of giant yellow or golden rockfly eyes…  
  
Another interpretation holds that recurring paired visions of this type represent, respectively, that which is searched for and that which may aid one in the search. But how can I search for G., knowing I shall never find him? And even if by some remote chance I could, how could the abovementioned giant golden rockfly eyes possibly be of any help? Though perhaps they, too, are not what they seem: if they are indeed eyes, it may be a matter of _who,_ rather than _what…_ again, I can only meditate on it further, and keep my own eyes out.  
  
Though I have one other idea. This southern hemisphere of Svivren is approaching its summer solstice in about a month. What if I performed the Storm Solstice ceremony? I know—it is strange to imagine performing the seasonal rituals anywhere other than Lasan (and that is why I have not done so here yet, even though I now have a proper staff housing). But the Sacred Light always flows so freely at those turning points of the year—why wouldn’t that be true on other worlds as well? Perhaps that is when the Ashla might finally give me some kind of sign about what I have been seeing…  
  
I shall do it. I shall ask Lua for that day off, and I shall begin preparing. There are parts of the chant in the little chant compendium I still have, and I used to be called on to do it often enough that I think I can piece together the rest. And there is the arboreal park outside town with that vast, lovely central lawn—what a perfect place that would be, and I bet it’s sublime at dawn…  
  
And now some hot tea, and off to the shop again. Fortunately no buttonholes scheduled for today.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> mealgrain: <http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Boiled_mealgrain>. Wookieepedia has it as being Mandalorian in origin, but I imagine it can be found all around the Galaxy too.  
>   
> Storm Solstice ceremony: Fanon; described in my and Raissa's [Lasat fanon post](http://boards.theforce.net/posts/54401430) under “Seasons, Observances, Celebrations.”


	14. Chapter 14

I performed the Storm Solstice ceremony at dawn, at the arboreal park. Oh, how glorious it was, with the lambent mists floating in the sky, the dewdrops glinting on the grass, all the leaves of all the trees taking on the rosy-golden hue of the morning! I stationed myself in the center of the great lawn with my staff, holding it before me so that my stone could catch the sun’s fire, and began the incantation exactly as I remembered it, in full voice: “Rejoice, O Lasan, in the light of Ashla that now floods you! Exult in the sovereign radiance that courses through your crust to your very core,” and so forth. Yes, I was no longer on Lasan and likely never would be again—but is not Lasan within me wherever I go?  
  
And as I intoned the ancient words, I remembered the very first time I presided over the ceremony, years ago—the first time I saw my love as captain of the High Honor Guard, standing in full uniform and armor, bo-rifle unslung in full ancient mode, ready to receive the sacred light from my focusing stone— _our_ stone—and how we saw each other, and stood there in awe, and how in that moment _we_ were the light of Lasan. And for a moment, even there, all alone—with no procession, no palace, no parade ground, no focusing lens—I thought I could see his magnificent form before me, his weapon at the ready, his troops arrayed behind him—  
  
And then golden light burst forth all around me, and the sky itself seemed to open up—and everything around me became the ruddy-gold star-mists—and there, above me, shining with all the purity of the primordial light, were the twin orbs of Lira San and her star, just as all the seers describe them! The ancient homeworld herself, smiling at me, beckoning to me from beyond all the lights that are above the stars! Oh, to find the Child, Warrior, and Fool who will lead me to you! Oh, how I thrill with awe even to write of it!  
  
It all disappeared, of course, as I finally lowered my staff and brought the incantation to its close. I stood again on the lawn of the arboreal park. The mists had cleared, the sun was up, and a gentle breeze was blowing. All was back to normal, and yet I could still feel a glowing in the Ashla, as though the sacred rites were not quite over. I looked around, trying to make sense of that feeling—and noticed someone standing nearby: a small being with large, bright eyes, half hidden by one of the trees but looking toward me. I went closer to investigate; whoever it was shied away behind the tree, but I could sense traces of the being’s presence. I went closer still and called out gently, assuring my visitor I meant no harm.  
  
At last she (for so I sensed it was, now that she was closer) came cautiously forward, hands clasped, head slightly bowed, looking timidly up at me. She was very small, smaller even than Wise Chava; I wondered if she was a child. She wore long robes, thick gloves, and some kind of breath mask that covered most of her face. But what struck me most of all were her eyes: large, round, faceted, and bright gold. Were those the golden spheres of my years of visions, here in this diminutive stranger who had been watching my ritual? And if so, what could it mean? It had to mean something, particularly since she was also the source of the curious, continuing glow in the Ashla. I had felt no such thing from any other being since I left Lasan.  
  
I hardly knew what to say, or whether to say anything; I think I simply gasped and stood there looking at her for several moments. Perhaps she felt uncertain as well, and a little afraid; she seemed to be trembling slightly. But she finally spoke, in a soft, meek, high voice—and it was one of the simplest yet strangest utterances I have ever heard: “May Telfien speak with you for a moment?” I naturally asked who this Telfien person was. Her response was to tap her own chest and say, “Telfien is this Gand.”  
  
I was still somewhat baffled, but I told her my name as well, and we strolled together for the park for several minutes. Along the way she told me of how she had seen visions of a towering figure with a staff surrounded by golden lightning flashes—and she said that the Mists (this seemed to be how she refers to the Ashla, which, after all, has many names) had pointed that figure out to her as someone who would not only be able to help her find what she has lost, but also whom she herself would be able to help. And apparently that was me—just as my visions of the golden spherical eyes seem to have been her (she does seem to be an insectoid of some kind). I thought immediately of that ancient commentary on visions representing “that which may aid one in the search.” She was certain it was true of her vision; was it true of mine as well?  
  
So I told her of my visions of her golden eyes, and of how they had alternated with visions of G. She listened closely and sympathetically, asking me several questions: when and where they had occurred, what I had felt, even about the headaches. I found myself telling her all; with her clear strength in the Ashla I felt I could trust her. When I mentioned the commentary about aiding in the search—I knew somehow that she would understand—she said that it was true: “the Mists have led you and Telfien together, so that you may help each other find what you have lost.” I said I was not sure anyone could help find the one I had lost. Her response: “Perhaps, perhaps not. The Mists alone know.”  
  
By then it was time for her to return to the spaceport—she had shipmates that would be waiting for her, she said—but she invited me to come find her there later in the day. I agreed. I admit I am a little nervous, a little incredulous. Telfien is meek and gentle and clearly means well, but I still do not understand how she or anyone else can help me. Though maybe I shall at least learn more about her and what brings her to Svivren. She can’t be here only because of me, can she? Can she?  
  
I shall have a cup of tea and perform a brief trance meditation before I go. My currents are whirling already.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Telfien is a member of the [Gand](https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Gand) species and one of my oldest (as in, first created) OCs; she’s one of the main characters in the stories of my [Gand Series](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1783291). I simply couldn’t resist teaming her up with Shulma.


	15. Chapter 15

May the Ashla guide my hand as I attempt to write of all that has happened. I am in hyperspace again—with friends this time, at least, but with just as much uncertainty as before, if not more.  
  
In a way, it is my fault. I should have heeded the Ashla’s caution when I first felt it, when its warning pangs twinged behind my eyes during my walk to the spaceport to meet Telfien, the Gand, yesterday evening. It was clearly a premonition of danger, but it was so indeterminate at the time that I paid it no heed.  
  
It was in the late afternoon, and Telfien was waiting for me there as planned. She led me to a docking bay at the far corner of the complex that held a sleek scout craft, bronze-colored with accents of green and dark pink and a design of stylized roses in those colors forming a border around the canopy. A tall, gangly young Human woman with two bright red-orange braids was doing repairs to one of the engine pylons, and an astromech droid with a transparent, blue-green-tinted dome was helping her. They both turned as Telfien approached, and Telfien greeted them with a bow of her head and her hands clasped before her. I hung back as unobtrusively as I could, for I still felt the twinge in my head, but Telfien beckoned to me to come closer and introduced me: “Telfien believes she is the one Telfien has been seeing all those times.” The Human looked me over cautiously for a few moments—I still am not used to the way my tall stature intimidates others—then nodded and said, “well, if Delphine has _seen_ you, then you’re probably all right.” She introduced herself as Glockel, the droid as R1-K4 (or Rika), and the ship, her ship, as the _Rose Evergreen._ I learned that they are semi-independent scouts who work throughout this part of the Outer Rim, and that they have recently secured a contract with a Hutt—a piece of information that gave me some pause (which I’m sure showed in my reaction), though Glockel was quick to reassure me that “Bonvika’s not like most other Hutts” (whatever that may mean). They were passing through this sector on their way back from some errands on Rugosa; originally their plan was to stop on Reuss VIII for supplies, but they detoured here to Svivren instead in response to Telfien’s visions of the giantess with the staff amid the lightnings. (“I guess that’s you,” Glockel laughed—she has a funny little tinkly Human laugh.)  
  
So yes: Telfien and her comrades were indeed there _because of me._ That knowledge brought an extra surge of pain to my head.  
  
Indeed, the pain had been growing the entire time they were speaking to me, despite my attempts both to hide it and ignore it. Presently Telfien asked Glockel of the happenings around the spaceport, and Glockel mentioned that she had seen an Imperial shuttle arrive at the spaceport an hour or so before—and just as she did my headache spiked so violently that I staggered backward. An image of Lua flashed before me: gripped and restrained against the wall of her shop by a large Human, her eyes clenched and her mouth open as if she were yelling for help— _akh karabast’aka,_ it was horrible, and oh, how my currents whirled! Telfien came over to me and asked if I was all right; no doubt she could feel my currents too. I told her I could sense danger, that I needed to go back; she offered to come with me. I protested that I didn’t want to put her in danger as well. To which she replied, “But two are stronger than one.”  
  
So we ran back through town to Lua’s shop as quickly as we could. A strange scene greeted us there: a crowd of townsbeings was clustered outside Lua’s shop, some peering fearfully inside, some murmuring to each other. An Imperial Stormtrooper was guarding the door, rebuffing anyone who dared to try to enter or ask questions. I made my way partway through the crowd, Telfien following me, till I could see through the front window. I bristled at what I saw inside: none other than the repulsive Moff Belphagor—the same who had kidnapped me from Lasan and tried to force himself on me en route to Svivren—was restraining Lua against a wall while another stormtrooper was blasting her materials and machines and equipment to bits with his rifle. I started to push forward through the crowd, but Telfien held me gently back and began to take something from inside one of her sleeves. “Stand back, Shulma Trilasha Orrelios,” she said, then rolled a small, round object into the crowd. There was a loud CRACK, and the crowd scattered suddenly, coughing and screaming. The trooper that had been guarding the door began trying in his ineffectual Imperial way to quell the chaos, and when it didn’t work he beat on the shop door to summon the other trooper, who soon ran out to assist him. Though I could see no explosion from Telfien’s bomb or grenade or whatever it had been, I caught a whiff of some kind of toxic fumes. (Telfien told me later that it was ammonia: “poison to oxy-breathers but not to the Gand.”)  
  
Now that the door was unguarded, she and I rushed into the shop and locked the door behind us. The place had been all but destroyed: burnt, ruined clothing and material were strewn about everywhere, all of the sewing machines and embroiderers were scorched and melted, and even PR—poor little PR who had done no one any harm!—lay in a twisted, molten mess in one corner. The moff was in the process of cuffing a struggling Lua in binders and was sneering in her face something about forcing her to mend his sheets. Then he turned, noticed me, and jumped about a half a meter in the air, his eyes bugging in angry horror: “You again!,” followed by something obscene he thought I should do with a disruptor rifle. _Ai rrhu’khu’ karabast’aka,_ how I seethed with rage! I simply could not restrain myself—I struck my foot to draw the lightning of the Ashla upward through me, then threw out my arms to send it full force at him, that Bogan-born scum! He lost his hold on Lua and fell to the floor unconscious with a screamed oath. Oh, how I yearned to char him to a withered crisp after all he had done! But I stopped myself, for that would be an abuse of the Ashla’s power and unworthy of a shaman of Lasan.  
  
Instead, I helped Lua to her apartment behind the shop, while Telfien gave the dear moff one more stun for good measure and secured him in the binders he had tried to use on Lua. By then some of the bystanders had begun to gather around the shop again, and the troopers were running back up, though I did not care. Once Telfien joined me and Lua, I locked the door of the apartment.  
  
Lua was unhurt but badly shaken. She told us everything that had happened: the moff had threatened to shut down her shop unless she gave him a cut of her profits. (According to her Ardennian friend with the knitting shop, he has been shaking down other non-Human shopkeepers this way, too.) Of course Lua had refused, upon which Belphagor had forced her to watch as his trooper rained blaster fire on everything in her shop, all her equipment, and all of the garments that her customers had brought in. We had arrived just as the moff was preparing to take her away as a slave—“I DIE ’fore I mend NO sheets o’ HIS!”  
  
Dearest Lua! Even now my heart aches to recall how shaken and near tears she was. And for good reason: this was now the second time the Empire had snatched her livelihood from her. At least she was safe, I tried to reassure her. “But you NOT safe!” I remember she said, pointing at me. “I don’ KNOW what you do to ol’ Belphagor, but they GONNA COME for you now!” She was right, of course: assaulting a high-ranking Imperial dignitary, especially in broad daylight with so many witnesses, was bound to attract the attention of the local Imperial authorities. Indeed, it already had, for I could hear shouting and pounding outside—the troopers were back and had almost certainly brought reinforcements.  
  
I remember how the three of us all looked at each other, knowing in that moment exactly what needed to be done. It was unwise to stay, or to wait any longer. Lua sprang from the couch and began puttering about, packing her personal effects. I headed up to my apartment by the back maintenance stairs to pack my own effects; it wouldn’t take long, for I hadn’t much I could call my own besides my clothing, my notebooks, and the few things that had come with me from Lasan. As I went I heard Telfien sending a comm message: “Pickup needed. Coordinates inbound.” Only minutes later we were all rushing up the maintenance steps to the roof of the building, Lua and I weighed down by our luggage, Telfien ahead of us with her blaster drawn. We reached the roof just as the sleek bronze craft with the rose design angled down toward us from the clouds, its boarding ramp extended. We helped Lua jump on board first, then followed her. And just in time, too, for reinforcements had indeed arrived down on the street and had spotted us. _Ashla’ka rrhava,_ those few moments were some of the most terrifying I have ever experienced—although the troopers’ blasters couldn’t reach us, they could certainly have called for starfighters. Thanks be to the Sacred Light that Glockel (who of course was piloting) jumped to hyperspace as quickly as she did.  
  
So here we are. Lua is getting some much-needed rest in Glockel’s cabin, Telfien is meditating in her own cabin, Glockel and Rika are in the cockpit, and I am sitting here with my journal in the small common area. Writing has helped calm my nerves somewhat after all that has happened, though I too am feeling ready for a rest (Glockel has offered me the use of the spare storage cabin in the back). I do not know where we are bound, or where I or Lua or any of us will find ourselves next, but I am infinitely thankful that I can at least lie down and rest in peace, among friends. (Once I move those storage crates off the bunk, that is.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Glockel, Bonvika: more OCs of mine from earlier stories. Glockel Sternenkranz is a Human female spacer from the fanon planet of Nydringia, and Bonvika Deseradii Feolla is a female-personality Hutt patron of the arts who is known for her mahvelous artistic and aesthetic tastes.
> 
> “But two are stronger than one”: An homage to one of Chang Chong-Chen’s lines in _The Blue Lotus_ (1935) by Hergé. Tintin has just rescued Chang from a flooded river, and Chang asks to come with him. Tintin warns that he “may be going into great danger,” but Chang responds by saying, “But two would be far stronger.”  
>   
> Telfien’s “small, round object” is an [ammonia bomb](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Ammonia_bomb).  
>   
> [Reuss VIII](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Reuss_VIII) (which in my mind is indeed pronounced “Royce”) and [Rugosa](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Rugosa) (yes, as in the kind of rose!) are established SW planets.


	16. Chapter 16

I have now been on board the _Rose Evergreen_ for a week. It is a Mesens Corporation SCT scout craft with three primary and two secondary sublight engines, one dual turbolaser turret, two dual laser cannon turrets, and an advanced sensor package for long-range reconnaissance—or so Glockel tells me, and I take her word for it. But the main thing is that it really is a bit too small. I don’t only mean that the spectre of low ceilings has returned to haunt me—but also that this ship seems not to be quite large enough for the four of us who are now on board. (Or five, rather, if I count Rika, the astromech—and she would insist on being counted.) Just sorting out accommodations has been no easy matter. Lua spent her first night on board sleeping in Glockel’s cabin, but of course that was never meant to be a permanent arrangement. Telfien immediately offered up her own cabin to us newcomers, insisting that her species needs very little sleep and that she can do her meditating quite happily in engineering or in the cargo bay. It was extremely gracious of her, and I came very close to taking her up on it (the back storage cabin is rather cramped, to say the least). But even with the airlock set to fill the room with oxygen, there is such a strong residual smell of ammonia as to be unbearable. Besides, since that room is the only one on the ship that can fill with ammonia, it would not be right to take it away from the only ammonia breather on board.  
  
So for the time being I am sharing the storage cabin with Lua and a variety of crates and containers. It is far from ideal, but again, at least I am safe and among friends—and far from Moff Belphagor.  
  
I say “among friends,” though I am not sure Glockel is exactly overjoyed to have two new beings joining her on her ship for an indefinite period of time. It is not that she has been unkind to me or to Lua, but whenever she speaks to us she always seems flustered and a bit abrupt, as if she has to run off to do something elsewhere on the ship at that moment. I have tried to make myself as useful as possible, because I really am grateful to her for taking Lua and me in, and I don’t want to be dead weight. At least she did seem to appreciate it when I moved all the crates off the bunks in the storage cabin. Also, she came up to me while I was cleaning the ’fresher yesterday, gave me a cordial slap on the upper arm (a little like G.’s older sisters used to do), and said, with one of her little laughs, “You don’t really need to do _that,_ you know!” So I suppose that is progress.  
  
Telfien treats me very graciously, but it is hard to make sense of her. I still have difficulty understanding her strange third-person manner of speech: _Telfien apologizes for X, please allow Telfien to Y._ On one hand, she is very solitary, spending most of her time meditating in her quarters—the only place she can breathe without her mask, of course, but it makes it hard to socialize with her. On the other hand, she seems to have a strange sort of shy curiosity about me. I have noticed her watching me from the doorway several times when I’ve sat in the galley to work on the ancient writings (the fold-out table in the storage cabin is simply too small), though each time she apologizes profusely and withdraws. That always gives me a pang, because I certainly don’t mean to frighten her off. Indeed, I am curious about her, too: her bond with the Ashla is so tranquil, so calmly luminous, much like Wise Chava’s was. I would welcome the chance to talk to her further about her visions, and even to hear her own story, but she is so shy, so secretive…  
  
As for Lua, she seems to be in much better spirits. She stayed in bed for most of our first day in hyperspace, and when she did get up she had only a little boiled mealgrain to eat—I think she might have had some space sickness—but she has rebounded considerably since then. She spent the day before yesterday reorganizing her sewing kit, which had become somewhat discombobulated during our escape from Svivren, and yesterday she sewed a button back on Glockel’s jacket when it fell off. She brought her galactic tiles set with her, too; she and I had a game yesterday (I lost, of course—no surprise there), during which she announced her eventual intention of teaching the others how to play as well.  
  
And here she is now, tile pouch in hand, ready to make good on her promise. May the Ashla protect us all!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Mesens Corporation SCT scout craft...long range reconnaissance”: All cribbed borrowed from <http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/SCT_Scout_craft>.


	17. Chapter 17

I had a most intriguing conversation with Telfien yesterday. I was sitting at the table in the galley, as usual, working on the Seventh Tractate, and once again I noticed her watching me from the doorway. She shied away, as before, but this time I set down my stylus and followed her. I caught up with her just as she was about to activate the airlock leading into her quarters, and asked her—as gently as possible, for I could tell I had startled her—if there was anything I could do for her. She answered a nervous yes, apologizing again for having interrupted my work; I reassured her that I didn’t mind at all. She then led me down one deck to the lower gun turret, where she said we could speak to each other more comfortably. I had never been down there before, but it was nice to find a quiet, comfortable nook on board the ship (since there is no space in the galley and the common area is not quiet at all).  
  
Telfien told me that ever since our departure from Svivren she has been thinking about what I had told her about my losses, my exile, and my visions, and of what she might be able to do to help me. She said she had spent the last few days meditating on that question, but her meditations were giving her no further insight: “all is still shrouded in fog,” were her words. It touched me deeply that she was devoting so much time and thought to helping me when our acquaintance was still so new, and I immediately offered to explain or elaborate on anything else she might need me to, and to answer any questions she might have. But that wasn’t it, she said; she thought it might instead have to do—and this is how she put it—with the way the Mists stormed so turbulently through me and I through them.  
  
I smiled wistfully at that, for Wise Chava used to say the same thing about my Ashla currents; she even used to call me her “storm-dreamer” (as if I were worthy to be classed with the true storm-dreamers of old, like Osthi and Berura). But what struck me even more was the fact that Telfien claimed to be meditating _with a specific objective in mind,_ in order to answer _specific questions_ —which seemed quite different from everything I learned about meditation. What the Revered Masters taught me was this: the purpose of meditation is to center oneself in the Ashla, to align one’s own currents with its currents, and only then to open oneself to whatever mystical message it might choose to send (and it is the Ashla that chooses that message, not us mortals). I said as much to Telfien, and I asked if she could tell me more about these meditations of hers. First she apologized for having confused me ( _karabast’aka,_ why does she apologize so much?), and went on to explain that this is the type of meditation practiced by all Gand Findsmen and Findswomen. The process she described to me was fascinating. I won’t go into great detail here (not least because I fear I still don’t understand it all correctly), but it is essentially a way of directly querying the Ashla—of receiving prophecy on demand, one might say, though on a much smaller scale than prophecy proper. It is something I am curious to discuss with her further.  
  
In any case, she asked me if I had any more of my visions, whether of G. or anyone or anything else. I realized I hadn’t had any since we had left Svivren, and for a moment that filled me with worry: does that mean that something within me has forgotten my home and my love? Though perhaps it is all for the best that my currents have had some time to rest after the shock they endured during our last day in Wrils. (I can almost hear Chava’s voice saying that to me. May the spirits watch over her, wherever she is!)  
  
Telfien did not seem worried about that either (in fact, she said nothing about it at all). Instead she invited me to perform a joint meditation with her, in case it would increase both our chances of gaining insight. I accepted—why wouldn’t I?—and we arranged to meet in the lower turret at 1800 today, which the chrono tells me is in just under an hour. She told me to bring a “focusing object” with me; naturally that will be my stone.  
  
So we shall see what good, if any, this will do. I admit I am still not quite sure. But it will be a learning experience, if nothing else. And perhaps—just perhaps—it will allow me to help Telfien, too, after all she has done for me.


	18. Chapter 18

Telfien and I finished our joint meditation about an hour ago. I am resting in bed as I write; it was an immensely taxing experience, both physically and spiritually, and I still do not fully know what to make of it. In some ways it was like the tandem rituals from my Lasan days—having to be so completely attentive and attuned to the other’s currents, for example—but in some ways it was completely different.  
  
We sat in the gunners’ seats facing each other. Before we began, I asked leave to chalk some preparatory glyphs, to which Telfien agreed. She watched intently as I drew the Flames of Contemplation on the ceiling surrounding the area where the two seats hung, and even complimented me on their beauty. I also asked her, on a whim, if there was any insight for which I could petition the Ashla on her behalf. “That is for the Mists to determine,” was her response to me, and I felt a momentary wistful pull in the Ashla at those words.  
  
We readied ourselves, holding our focusing objects before us. Telfien’s appeared to be some kind of small, ornate box, though I never got a good look at it. Then we began. I initiated a level-four trance, which seemed the closest thing to the techniques she had described before. She closed her eyes and began her trance as well.  
  
At first all went as expected with my trance. As the moments slipped into minutes and the minutes into hours, I felt my stone begin to spark with the sacred light, and I became aware of my own currents moving through the luminous fabric of the Ashla. I followed their flow, contemplating the patterns they made and the shapes into which they formed themselves: places, things, beings. Lasan’s cliffs, Svivren’s gray streets. Friends, family, locals, and of course my love. But then new images began to creep in among them, like ink diffusing through water or mists filtering in at evening. I saw places I didn’t know: a humble home, a humble garden, a marketplace, a temple on a mountaintop. Mists filled everything. I saw beings I didn’t know—beings like Telfien, with large bright faceted insect’s eyes and wearing long, solemn robes, trooping and milling in solemn patterns. But there was one who stood still, gazing and staring with piercing silver eyes—like the orbs I had seen in my earlier visions, only much _colder._ And in one sudden instant he (for so I knew it was, somehow) turned his back on all the other beings that were there, and disappeared—and I saw the huge, gray wedges of Imperial capital ships piercing and scattering the surrounding mists—and there was nothing but sorrow and cold, blank light.  
  
But then the scene shifted again, and I saw a dingy, foggy, seedy place filled with dingy, foggy, seedy beings—a bit like some of the more sordid neighborhoods of Wrils, though it wasn’t Wrils—and there was that other silver-eyed Gand, walking, no, prowling among them, with some strange sort of double-barreled blaster rifle drawn. A droid walked at his side, humanoid-shaped but also somehow with insect’s eyes. Both of them disappeared into the seedy shadows, and all went dark.  
  
I realized what I had seen: a glimpse of my new friend’s own losses and sorrows. Someone she missed, someone she wished she could find. I may even have stumbled upon some small clue about what he was doing or where to find him. In any case, all of it was more vivid than anything I have ever seen before in a level-four trance, and my currents are still reeling. But I am now resolved more than ever to help her, too, find what she has lost.  
  
One thing I noticed: Telfien came out of her meditation before I did, and she jumped, startled, when I opened my eyes and came out of mine, and avoided my gaze when she asked me how my meditation went. I haven’t told her everything yet, but I wonder if she knew what I had seen—and I wonder if I was _not_ supposed to see what I had seen.  
  
But that is something I must ponder later, for now I hear the siren signaling our return to realspace.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The scenes from Telfien’s story that Shulma sees come from various [Gand Series](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1783291) stories. Some of the relevant ones are not posted on AO3 yet, but for now see especially [Between the Porch and the Altar](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24664576) and [What She Saw](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24667864). 
> 
> You may recognize the male Gand and the insect-eyed droid as [Zuckuss](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Zuckuss) and [4-LOM](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/4-LOM).


	19. Chapter 19

  
Back in hyperspace again! I suppose this is the life of a semi-independent scout, or whatever it is Glockel calls herself—though for me it is taking some getting used to. If it weren’t for the space-sickness tablets in the ’fresher cabinet (whose tube proclaims them a “PATENTED HOMEOPATHIC BLEND FROM MONIRON”), I would probably not be well enough to write this.  
  
Earlier today we docked on Mayno-Mayzee, in the Kanson-Wiss sector, just widdershins of the Centrality. Glockel and Telfien were off conferring with some contact of theirs in the culture ministry there. Meanwhile, Rika stayed with the ship, and Lua and I went for a stroll in the lush parklands outside the embassy, with their magnificent arboray tree groves. We talked of this and that: life on board the _Rose Evergreen,_ things we missed about our homeworlds, things we missed about Svivren (and I was surprised to realize that there were several—I suppose there is some truth to the adage that we mortals don’t appreciate what we have until it’s gone), and of course the situation with the Empire. I reflected that they now had forced Lua from her livelihood twice, once on Pipada and once on Svivren. She shrugged—I can hardly believe how stoical she is about this!—and said that at least now she knows that something is being done about it. That was when she mentioned her son again. (I confessed that I couldn’t recall his name; she told me what it was, and when I looked bewildered she said, “that okay, you JUST CALL him Pao.”)  
  
It seems he had indeed come to visit her that time—the time about a month before Telfien witnessed my Storm Solstice ceremony, when I had heard a second Drabatan voice conversing with her in her apartment. During that visit he had told her then that he was on his way to join some kind of much larger alliance or rebellion that was fighting the Empire (Lua glanced cautiously around as she said this, as if to make sure no one else could hear our conversation). He could not tell her exactly what this organization was, or where he was going, or even whether he’d ever see her again. She was (and is) naturally very worried for him, even as she was proud of him for continuing the fight. It was the first I had heard of this, and I expressed my amazement: first, that such a rebellion existed, and second, that Lua had been able to go on from day to day with something like this on her heart. Ah, but she didn’t want me to worry about him too, she said, what with all the other griefs and troubles weighing on my own mind. Besides, she went on to point out, this was one good thing about traveling through the Outer Rim with two semi-independent scouts: she now has some small chance of finding out where he has gone, and perhaps of joining him.  
  
So that makes three of us who are looking for someone lost: Telfien, Lua, and myself. I wonder if Glockel is too; she hasn’t said anything, of course. Though am I really _looking_ anymore? There may no longer be anyone for me to look for. And yet Telfien was right in saying that time that “the Mists alone know”: the Ashla alone knows. And now, on top of all that, to learn of this rebellion or alliance fighting the Empire… ah, so many questions for the Ashla next time Telfien and I meditate together! (If she agrees; I fear I caused her some distress last time we did.)  
  
At any rate, when Lua and I returned to the ship, we found Glockel and Telfien in the common area, where Rika was playing back for them a holographic message that had arrived while we were all away. The sender seemed to be either Human or near-Human, and even though the transmission as very indistinct and garbled it was clearly urgent in tone. I heard something about a temple, a code downloaded to Rika, and reporting to someone on a private frequency.  
  
Glockel explained it all afterward. It was the culture minister of the neighboring planet of Khorassan, one Ardyse Goldfleck-Straz, and she was urging Glockel and Telfien and Rika to take one of her world’s treasures—a set of jewels used in one of the planet’s major festivals, I think it was?—into safe keeping and out of the reach of the local Imperial moff, by the name of Waddsley, who is apparently en route to claim them. Further, it seems that Goldfleck-Straz knows their employer, Bonvika the Hutt, and had heard from her Mayno-Mayzeean colleague (Mayno-Mayzat? Mayno-Mayzite? I have never understood demonyms in Basic) that Bonvika’s agents were in the sector. And it was a legitimate message: Rika was able to confirm the originating frequency and everything. “Now, you don’t have to come with us if you don’t want to,” she said very pointedly to me and Lua (G.’s drum corps commander was a little like that when I first met her). I simply looked her in the eye and said that I very much intended to come along and to help in any way that I could. Telfien’s expression is always inscrutable, of course, but the clicks I heard from behind her mask seemed to bespeak approval, and I shall never forget the way she looked squarely at her colleague and said, “You will be glad to have her beside you, Glockel Sternenkranz.”  
  
Lua of course agreed to come as well: “I HELP best I CAN, even if it mean just put bacta PADS on YOU THREE.”  
  
So, now, off to Khorassan. I don’t know what will await us, or what a moff wants so badly with festival jewels, though I suppose the sheer length and breadth of Imperial avarice should no longer surprise me. For my own part, it is time for another PATENTED HOMEOPATHIC space-sickness tablet. Then perhaps to ask Telfien if she would agree to a second joint meditation.

* * *

She asked me first! It was as though she could tell I was about to ask her something as I approached her in the common area. I suppose given the way she can query the Ashla directly for answers, it stands to reason that she would be attuned to the way it moves around those with questions. Thankfully the whole experience was less tiring this time, now that I know better what to expect.  
  
We went to the lower gunner’s turret again. Each of us held our focusing objects on our laps, and once again I chalked the Flames of Contemplation on the ceiling. It started much the same way as it had the first time, with the images of familiar beings and places, then the new ones filtering in—though this time I saw the young Drabatan, Pao, as well as the silver-eyed Gand. And then I saw all of the shadowy visions turn their gaze as a new, unfamiliar scene appeared: two immense pyramidal towers, as of some ancient temple or palace, rising like majestic sentinels above a vast, lush jungle at dawn. Those towers were full of beings of all sentient species who waved cheerfully down at the other shadowy beings around them, and saluted them… were they the ones who were fighting the Empire, the ones Pao had joined? Were they somehow the key to finding those we had lost? Where were they?  
  
I still don’t know, and I have a dark feeling that I won’t have a chance to ponder it much further until we are back from our errand on Khorassan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Moniron: A fanon planet created by **earlybird-obi-wan** , homeworld of her fanon species the Dunai and Dunai-Elder (see here). The patented homeopathic space sickness remedy from there was created by me for a different story that isn't on AO3 yet.  
>   
> The planet of Mayno-Mayzee is my own fanon creation. It and the arboray tree grove strolled in by Shulma and Lua were introduced in [A Lesson under the Arboray Trees?](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12577536). For suggesting the name of the equally fanon Kanson-Wiss Sector, in which it is located, I am indebted to **Raissa_Baiard**.  
>   
> Arboray trees: <http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Arboray_tree>  
>   
> Centrality: <http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Centrality>  
>   
> widdershins: A term I learned from my old friend Beedo. Its [real-life meaning](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Widdershins) is “counterclockwise” or “opposite in direction to the sun’s apparent motion,” but he used it in SW stories to mean “opposite to the direction of the Galaxy’s rotation,” with its opposite being “turnwise.”  
>   
> Khorassan is my own fanon creation and a neighboring planet of Mayno-Mayzee in the Kanson-Wiss Sector. It, the festival and the jewels used therein, and the culture minister were introduced in a story not yet posted on AO3: [The Jewels of . . . WHAT?!](https://boards.theforce.net/threads/the-jewels-of-what-fic-gift-for-ewok-poet-borrowed-oc-%E2%80%94complete-as-of-1-31.50043531/). The culture minister was not named in that story, and this is the first in which she is given a name.  
>   
> “G.’s drum corps commander”: A reference to Mid. Lt. Maranga Patithi from [Romance among the Stones](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19965346/chapters/47262745). In that story she was just part of the Honor Guard Drum Corps, but she became its commander later and served in that capacity during Zeb’s captaincy.  
>   
> “two immense pyramidal towers, as of some ancient temple or palace… above a vast, lush jungle at dawn”: She is, of course, seeing the Massassi Temple on Yavin IV—headquarters of the Rebellion at this period, as we all know.


	20. Chapter 20

It is done. O sovereign Ashla, your mercy is great: the festival jewels are safe, but more importantly, Culture Minister Goldfleck-Straz is safe, and so are we. And yet I still have so many questions—or, rather, one large question…  
  
But later. For now I shall do my best to recount all that has happened.  
  
It was mid-morning when we docked in the Khorassani capital, called Khorassograd. (The Ashla alone knows why Humans are so pedestrian in their choice of place names; the capital of Mayno-Mayzee was Mayzopolis.) Following the instructions Culture Minister Goldfleck-Straz had provided in her transmission, we went first to the large temple outside town to retrieve the festival jewels. The Temple of Mak-Gu-Fina, they call it—it is one of the planet’s foremost historical sites, dating from the First Rakatan Period, and it is used nowadays chiefly as the venue of the culminating ceremonies of Khorassan’s annual Days of Love and Light festival. The jewels apparently belong to the regalia worn by the Queen of Love and Light and her court of dancers and attendants, and are kept in their own storage area in the temple’s lower levels. (We learned all this from a quick comb of local databanks before setting out.)  
  
The temple is a massive black stone structure with spear-like spires at each of its four corners. (It was not the temple from my vision during the hyperspace journey, as I quickly saw: the shape was wrong, and the surrounding terrain was wrong.) There was a security droid on duty, which opened the gigantic rune-carved doors for us once Rika supplied the access code.  
  
O gracious Ashla, few times before have I been in a place so active with your presence! How I could feel your spark and flow at every moment, crackling, twinging, overwashing my whole being! How the visions crowded around me—the ghostlike forms of lost friends and loved ones and even the slightest, most disconnected acquaintances pressing so closely around me that I could barely see where I was going, and as a result I still cannot reliably describe how the interior of the place looked (though later Lua said it was just the same plain black stone everywhere anyway). Short, bright pangs danced in my head all the while. Telfien seemed affected by the place too; she was unsteady as she walked.  
  
Once we came to the stairs leading up (apparently in order to get to the lower level one had to go up the altar stairs first, and then down the other side), both of us staggered and fell almost simultaneously. Fortunately it was not from too high up, but it left me at least so disoriented that I had to remain sitting for some moments, disregarding Glockel’s laughing rebuke of “Oh, _honestly,_ you two!” as she went on ahead. (I don’t actually blame her; _someone_ had to.) And that was when—O sovereign spirit, I can barely write of it—  
  
I turned and saw G. sitting beside me, clear as life, leaning toward me with concern. _And this time he spoke to me_ —and I remember what he said: “Aw, darlin’, what’s the matter?”  
  
And I blinked, and he was gone.  
  
I’m not sure how long I sat there in a daze. It was the first time any of my apparitions had ever spoken to me, real words that I could hear. And once again he was so clear and lifelike— _lir’Ashla’ka,_ could that possibly mean—  
  
How I wished I could have meditated on it further, there amid your million fiery sparks, O spirit of the universe! But there wasn’t time. The others soon found the jewels and took them out of their storage cabinet downstairs. (I felt rather bad for being so useless, especially after Telfien had recommended me to Glockel, but both of them insisted that it was all right; “it just a GREAT BIG BOX,” according to Lua.) They showed them to me: aurodium breastplates and necklaces set with delicate pink-white ultima pearls and small white solari crystals, and, most magnificent of all, a tiara set with a single, large blush-green solari crystal that fairly blazed with the Ashla’s own lightning. I recall the sparks that shot through me when I touched it; I thought I could even feel my own humble kreposkolite stone, hidden deep in my satchel, thrumming in resonance. Only for a moment, though: we had to be on our way. We locked the tiara and necklaces inside Rika for safekeeping, stashed some of the breastplates in my satchel and some more inside Telfien’s cloak, and started back toward town.  
  
Back aboard the _Rose Evergreen,_ Rika locked the jewels in the ship’s safe, and Telfien and Glockel opened a comm channel to the culture minister’s private frequency, just as she had requested of us once everything had been safely retrieved. But there was no answer there, nor was there one at the regular frequency for the culture ministry. At last we hurried to the ministry offices—thankfully we were docked at the governmental complex, so they were not too far off.  
  
There was a barely functional secretary droid at the front desk that looked like he had taken a blaster shot. Rika did her best to arc-weld his frazzled circuits back together, while Telfien asked him if he had heard anything from Culture Minister Goldfleck-Straz. What he told us filled us with consternation: Goldfleck-Straz had been escorted away by Moff Waddsley and her guards just a few hours before. One of the guards shot him when he protested. Once Rika got his circuits more or less reconnected, he thanked us and announced his intention of heading to the on-site droid shop for further repairs. Lua walked there with him, just to be safe.  
  
We had to think for a moment about what to do next. We would be no match for the Imperial authorities—but it felt wrong simply to leave without trying to do anything to help the culture minister. At very least, though, we could try to find out more about where she was and why. The sector’s Imperial headquarters was back on Mayno-Mayzee, some three hundred klicks south of the capital; Glockel said she and Rika might be able to slice into their computer system if we moved closer.  
  
So we returned there, docked in an open field at a safe distance from the headquarters (a large domed building), and Glockel and Rika got to work. It took them just under two hours to enter the Imperial system, and another three-quarters of an hour to slice into the prisoner records—only to find that there was no record of an Ardyse Goldfleck-Straz anywhere in the system. Lua was worried that she had been terminated, but Telfien pointed out how unlikely that would be if the moff’s objective was to get her to reveal the location of the jewels. So Glockel continued rummaging in the computer system for clues. I remember how we were all hunched around her at the _Rose Evergreen_ ’s main terminal, eyes all squinting at the viewscreen’s white-blue glow for what felt like hours. Little by little she managed to pull up various pieces of information on the moff: her first name (Melvadora), her appointment calendar (full of upscale social events), her home address (in a posh suburb of Mayzopolis), and various routine files and records—including several payments to expensive fashion and wig boutiques on her official Imperial expense account. Still nothing about Goldfleck-Straz, however. Telfien offered to “consult the Mists”—I presume that meant performing one of her Findswoman’s meditations—but Glockel expressed the concern that there wouldn’t be enough time (even our joint meditations had taken upward of three hours). At last we decided to try our luck looking for clues at the moff’s own residence; we figured we had some time, as the appointment calendar had her away all evening at the “Vanderbleck Station Gala Mixer” (whatever that was). In the off chance it would come in handy, we downloaded all the information we found onto my datapad.  
  
We arrived in Moff Waddsley’s neighborhood close to sundown. Her house was one of those shoddy mass-produced mansions crowded with absurdly shaped spires and dormers—there had been neighborhoods full of them outside Wrils, too. Naturally we scanned the area from orbit first to ensure there were no security systems or anything to hinder us. There was one, it turned out, but after some investigation Rika found one third-floor dormer window on the house’s west side that was just out of reach of the electronic eye. We agreed that Telfien and I would go: Telfien because of the stealth and tracking techniques she knew as a Findswoman, and I because I had feet that could climb walls. (Logical, no?) Everyone else would remain aboard the _Rose Evergreen_ and keep it ready for a swift departure if necessary.  
  
“If you can walk, you can climb,” my people always used to say. I suppose I am now living proof of that, though I barely know how I managed, given that it had been more than a decade and a half since these toe pads had gripped any kind of vertical surface. There were several false starts, more than several slips, and a terrible moment when Telfien’s respirator hose got tangled in my arm. We finally made it up to that window, but I shall go on record to say that that _diminutive_ Gand was much heavier than she looked. (Her exoskeleton, no doubt, combined with all that respirator gear.)  
  
The window belonged to a large, luxurious dressing room. Apparently this Moff Waddsley fancied herself quite the fashion plate; a gigantic semicircular walk-in closet dominated one side of the room, a large and rather cluttered dressing table lined the other, and between the two stood a lighted display shelf full of wigs resting on mannequins. Mirrors were almost everywhere, covering much of the remaining wall space as well as some of the ceiling. We searched the room for some time but found nothing relating to the missing culture minister. At one point Telfien noticed something in the closet, on a rack of scarves, that she took out and looked at carefully—a long green sash with embroidered designs. “So this is where it went,” she said, pocketing it inside her cloak. (She explained everything later; it used to be part of her ceremonial attire and had been taken from her during the Imperial occupation of her planet, probably by stormtroopers while she was unconscious.)  
  
Telfien left the room to continue the search, and I was about to follow when one of the wigs caught my eye. It was clearly made of Lasat hair, the same color and texture as my own, though styled into an large, exaggerated cascade of ringlets that no self-respecting daughter of Lasan would even think of wearing. A dreadful thought filled my mind and was confirmed when I turned the wig over and read the label inside: TRISHÉ D’S WIG BOUTIQUE, WRILS, SVIVREN.  
  
I knew what I was going to do, and told Telfien to wait for me a moment. As the Ashla lived, no Imperial was going to have any part of Shulma Trilasha Orrelios as a trophy…  
  
I inhaled and clenched my fists, concentrating the sacred lightning within me. I struck my foot to propel it upward. Then I thrust out my hands to send it flying at those pretty, cascading ringlets, not stopping until each one of them was fried to a black crisp. It was eminently satisfying.  
  
That done, I joined Telfien in the hallway, and we continued our search. There really is not much to say besides that we used up a great deal of time _searching_ and not _finding,_ fearing all the while that the moff might turn up at any moment. (Though we did come across the security system controls in one of the spare rooms, and disabled them—that is, blasted them.) Sometimes Telfien seemed to have her eyes closed as she walked, with one hand extended queryingly before her; I wondered if that had something to do with her tracking techniques. I too was keeping my senses out for the distinctive ripples that sentient life sends through the Ashla.  
  
At long last we caught something and followed it up a narrow spiral staircase in one of the kitchen closets. There was a locked door at the top, at which we knocked. A middle-aged Human female voice answered: “You already know my answer, Mel.” “Not her but Telfien and Shulma, from Bonvika,” Telfien replied, at which the voice behind the door apologized that she couldn’t let us in—the door was locked on the outside. We simply blasted it, of course, and went inside.  
  
We found ourselves in a small, dingy servant’s room with no furnishings except a table, a chair, and a rather ratty sofa. A Human woman, probably equivalent in age to about fifty dust seasons, was sitting on the sofa and rose as we entered. Even for her species, she was not tall—but she certainly was quite distinctive looking, with short, spiky pink hair (a color I have never seen before on Humans), large silver ear-hoops, a crystal necklace, and a pantsuit of pearlescent blue-grayish material that would have met with Mama’s approval. “You got them, right?” she asked first, and we answered in the affirmative. “Brilliant. I’m ready to go when you are.”  
  
As quickly as we could, we made our way down the spiral stairs, through the kitchen, through the parlor and the library to the side entrance—only come face to face with a tall, haughty-faced Human woman in an excessively puffy electric-blue evening gown—Moff Waddsley herself, with two security droids in tow. “And where do you think _you’re_ going, little Ardy Goldfleck?!” Goldfleck-Straz retorted with something, then Waddsley retorted with something, and so on back and forth till Waddsley said something like, “Never mind, go ahead. I’ll be back for you, sometime when your cute little bug and your big dumb beast aren’t around to protect you.”  
  
My blood boiled at this, of course, and in that moment I gladly would have thrown the full strength of the sacred lightning at her. But Waddsley was right, of course. Even if we had left with Goldfleck-Straz, there would have been nothing to stop the moff from coming back to give her more trouble later—no matter that the jewels were out of her reach. Nor would it actually have been wise to try anything in the presence of those security droids. We were stuck, it seemed.  
  
That was when Telfien spoke—not to Waddsley but to me: “The datapad. The expenses. Show her.”  
  
I understood. I took out the datapad and showed her the financial records Glockel had found while slicing into the Imperial systems back on the _Rose Evergreen_ —explaining all the while, in the most genteel and civil tones possible for a _big dumb beast,_ how delighted the Grand Moff would _not_ be to learn that one of his sector governors was spending the Empire’s funds on dresses and wigs. And know he would, if Waddsley gave Goldfleck-Straz or the Khorassani government any trouble, about festival jewels or anything else, ever again.  
  
I swear Moff Waddsley turned four or five different shades of red within the space of as many seconds. She puffed and sniffed like an overheated bantha, eyes tearing up, fists balling up, lower lip quivering. Finally she sniveled at us to get lost. We were only too glad to oblige.  
  
So we are en route back to Khorassan now. Culture Minister Goldfleck-Straz is engaged in a cheerful game of galactic tiles with Lua, and the jewels from the temple remain securely locked in the safe. I can feel their ping and spark, and I think my focusing stone can too: it has been vibrating with the strangest, most haunting tone this entire trip.  
  
And all of this is giving me an idea, and once we arrive there is a favor I would like to ask of both Telfien and the culture minister…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Temple of Mak-Gu-Fina, Days of Love and Light, Queen of Love and Light, jewels, etc.: See notes at the end of [the previous chapter](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25337692/chapters/63989266).
> 
> “by stormtroopers while she was unconscious”: This is exactly what happens at the end of [Between the Porch and the Altar](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24664576).
> 
> “TRISHÉ D’S WIG BOUTIQUE, WRILS, SVIVREN”: See chapters [7](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25337692/chapters/62163940) and [8](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25337692/chapters/62275039) of this story, and especially [Three Strands](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20930357).


	21. Chapter 21

We are on Khorassan now. As guests of the planetary government, we have been given accommodations at the finest hotel in Khorassograd (though Telfien still must stay in her quarters on the _Rose Evergreen_ because of the ammonia). Yesterday evening the culture ministry hosted a reception in our honor. I noted that Telfien wore over her robes the sash that she had taken from Moff Waddsley’s closet, and for my own part I was glad of another chance to wear the lovely brocade dress Lua made for me. The others looked quite nice as well; Lua wore a beautifully tailored dark green suit, and Glockel’s dress had an embroidered bodice and numerous colorful ribbons. (Nor should I forget Rika, whose paint was touched up for the occasion.) It was a most pleasant evening, and we were greatly touched by the hospitality and kindness shown us by our Khorassani hosts. (As one older gentleman said with a shrug, “It’s the Love and Light spirit.”)  
  
Ardyse (as she has kindly invited us to call her) told us some of the history of her difficulties with Moff Waddsley. It turns out they were classmates at one of Khorassograd’s finest prep schools, and every summer they would go with a group of friends to the Days of Love and Light festival. They went separate ways after school: Melvadora (who has not given us leave to address her by her given name, but I don’t care) to the Imperial academy on Carida, and Ardyse to Khorassograd University, where she studied business administration and arts management. Both were successful in their careers; seven years ago Ardyse was appointed culture minister of Khorassan, and it was two years afterward that Melvadora was made governor of the Kanson-Wiss sector.  
  
Now, here is where things enter the realm of conjecture. As part of her duties as culture minister, Ardyse is coordinator of the Days of Love and Light and keeper of the jewels used in its ceremonies. She thus knows of their mystical properties, and those of the temple where the ceremonies take place, though she confesses she doesn’t fully understand them. But she has heard rumors that certain branches of the Imperial authority have an interest in anything that may have mystical properties of that type—and that would certainly explain Melvadora’s almost obsessive interest in the jewels, which she no doubt remembered from their festival visits together long ago. Naturally, Ardyse did not relish the idea of turning over her homeworld’s ancient treasures to the Empire—but since Bonvika the Hutt has long been an enthusiastic supporter and generous sponsor of the Days of Love and Light, Ardyse knew she could trust Bonvika’s agents (namely Telfien, Glockel, and Rika) to take the jewels into safekeeping and out of the Empire’s reach. It turns out—and she asked me to keep this a secret—there is also a set of decoy jewels, made out of regular quartz and freshwater pearls, that the culture minister keeps on hand in case anything happens to the originals. Thus Khorassan’s most famous festival will at least be able to go on.  
  
I have been thinking about our time in the Temple of Mak-Gu-Fina, and of the sparks and currents and visions that filled the place: most especially the vision of my Zeblove who spoke to me, and how very alive he seemed in that moment. I wonder if Ardyse would allow me to visit the temple again, to see what other omens might bloom in such a place. Better yet, perhaps Telfien and I could go there together, to directly query the Ashla (or Mists, as she says) in a joint meditation—and that might finally bring an answer to the question that has been plaguing me all these years...  
  
I brought it up to Telfien earlier today. She seemed to be expecting me to, and naturally she immediately guessed what I wished to ask of the Ashla. (Ah, Shulma, you’re becoming predictable, aren’t you!) She readily agreed, though she warned me that such a meditation might be longer and more difficult than our previous ones. Apparently it is a tricky business meditating on whether someone is alive or dead, particularly when the being in question has been absent for so long: the mystical signature or presence by then is so attenuated that it may be spread out over a large portion of the universe, and as a result the sparks or wisps take longer to return to the one searching. Telfien asked if I had anything that belonged to my husband, which could at least act as a focal point for reuniting those sparks or wisps. I of course have his knife from the Honor Guard; she said that would do admirably. This evening we shall see Ardyse and ask her if we might visit the temple once more.

* * *

Success! Ardyse has given her permission; she says we may use the access code we already have. We go tomorrow, at daybreak.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I imagine the “Love and Light Spirit” on Khorassan as being akin to the [Aloha Spirit](https://www.hawaii.edu/uhwo/clear/home/lawaloha.html) of Hawai‘i. The first time I learned of the Aloha Spirit was from a custom framer in Oakland, himself of Hawaiian origin, who had just gone above and beyond in fulfilling my framing order in some way. I thanked him for his generosity, and he said pretty much what the man at the reception says: “It’s just the Aloha Spirit.”


	22. Chapter 22

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was co-written with my awesome and talented friend **aikisenshi** , whom I cannot thank enough for adding her talents and wonderful OCs to this story. It will be clear from the change of voice in this chapter where her contribution to the chapter begins.

O ASHLA SOVEREIGN AND SUBLIME O SPIRIT BEYOND ALL SPIRITS what is this you have told me? Can it be, can it really be?  
  
But it _must_ be—for you tell no lies, O Life of the universe—  
  
You, my love, my mate, my mighty bristlecone—crown of all Lasan’s warriors and her prophesied Last Warrior—oh, do I dare write it?  
  
Oh, how my whole being is a storm! Thunder and lightning fill me! My head—and oh, my currents—  
  
But I must not let them overcome me now. I must collect myself and tell all.  
  
Day was just dawning as Telfien and I arrived at the Temple of Mak-Gu-Fina. Rika was not with us this time but had the loaded the security code onto a data chip for us beforehand, which we presented to the security droid for access. Once again the Ashla twinged and sparked all about me in constant activity; once again the visions and ghosts crowded and hounded me. I am almost surprised I made it to the top of the altar stairs without stumbling.  
  
The altar itself was not large: a simple stone cube about a half meter on each side, sitting at the center of a large, flat, equally simple stone surface. The Ashla seemed to move more calmly there for some reason—thankfully, as the rapidly shifting visions were becoming oppressive. We positioned ourselves on either side of the stone cube, facing each other, and with our focusing objects set before us; Telfien had me place G.’s knife atop the cube, in its center. I chalked the Flames of Contemplation in a circle around us, this time adding the Four Protecting Cloaks on each of the four sides. Telfien, meanwhile, opened the lacquer box sitting before her—a music box that filled the vaulted space with eerily sparkling melody.  
  
O merciful Ashla, I thought that this time I would be prepared—I thought this time I knew what to do and how everything would go. But nothing went as before. This time the images and visions did not filter in gently, as they did the first two times. Instead, they overwhelmed me like a gigantic wave, and they were all swirled together so that I could not tell which of them originated with me, which with Telfien, and which elsewhere. G. morphing into a Gand morphing into Moff Belphagor into who knew whom else…  
  
The sparks of my answer (Telfien had taught me how to identify them) were there, caught up in it all, near-imperceptible in the mad rush. Whether or not they were the _right_ sparks I could not yet tell, but they were there. I strained with every wisp of my powers to catch them, but too often the flood of visions would wash over me again, buffeting them from my grasp and swallowing them back up, and I would be forced to strain and search for them once again—and again and again. For hours and hours _and hours_ I battled that mystical maelstrom to grasp at those sparks—and yet those that I held formed no image, no answer. I felt tears, I felt gasps, I felt cries of pain. The ache in my head grew, flashing lights danced in my eyes. Through it all I still heard the music box, now joined by another high-pitched metallic droning sound. Was it the knife? My stone? Both?  
  
All went dark. I felt myself collapse in exhaustion against the stone cube, dissolving in tears of failure and guilt. Surely I had ruined the meditation, and we would need to begin the whole lengthy process again. One of my hands gripped my focusing stone till its sharp edges dug into me. The other grasped upward toward the knife simply because it needed something to grasp—  
  
—and as soon as I touched it was when I saw him, once again clear and lifelike and magnificent. But not alone: there were several others around him, though no one I recognized. There were two women, strong, queenly leaders whose heads were crowned with graceful tentacles or tails, though of different shapes and colors. There were several Humans, male and female, various ages. An older man in armor with a bald head, a young woman in armor with brightly colored hair of blue and orange. A bearded man with a sword made of light; a boy with a sword made of light, who looked up at the bearded man as to a teacher and at my love as to an older brother. A droid—two droids, one short and one tall. And still others appeared around them, shining in and out like twinkling stars: friends, allies, brothers- and sisters-in-arms. And the music still sounded.  
  
And he spoke to me: “Here I am, darlin’.”  
  
He held out his hand to me, and I placed mine in his—  
  
—and just then all the sacred lightnings burst forth at once in a whitegold blaze and the Ashla itself and the entire universe proclaimed YES—YES HE IS—YES HE LIVES and in return my whole being said YES and my whole being was YES— _Ai rrhu’khu’ Ashla’ka lira y-khi rrhava—_  
  
I came to in my bunk on the _Rose Evergreen,_ my head filled with blinding pain and my heart with mortal ecstasy. I am still there now. My currents still rage within me; the lightnings assail me on all sides. Welcome back, vision shock, my old friend...  
  
But now the purpose of my existence is to find you, my mighty bristlecone, my Gara z e b  
  
_[The writing trails off here, and another hand begins.]_  
  
My Friend Shulma, please forgive me for intruding on your privacy. Our friend Telfien gave me your journal in the hopes that I might find in it some clues to what ails you. With the aid of a translation program, I have been able to somewhat decipher your language and have skimmed through much of your writing. You have been through much, my friend.  
  
I have been able to stabilize your fever, and heal the injuries to your hands, but there is great discord surrounding your Force song, your presence in the Ashla, as you call it here in this journal. It is going to require some deep mental delving to calm it, I think. I believe I can do it, though I have never really done something quite like this. I will be handing this journal off to my—well, were I still a Jedi, he would be called a Padawan. I find myself using that term often, but ‘apprentice’ is probably the correct (and safer) word for what my cousin’s son is to me. He will be taking my dictation as I continue.  
  
Let us hope, for both our sakes, friend, that we emerge unscathed from this.  
  
_[Handwriting changes.]_  
  
On my initial examination, the patient presented with a high fever, body tremors, and was unresponsive to her name being called. Ay, listen to me, I sound like I am dictating to a droid in the Temple Medical wing, old habits resurface at odd times.  
  
Shulma did react, however, when she was touched. She mumbled, and shouted, phrases in what I assume was Lasat. Then she swung a hand towards me, as if swatting away an insect. Thank the Stars Above I am nimble enough to move when the Force warns me, or I would have been knocked head over tail. Her people are obviously quite strong.  
  
A Force soothing, combined with a mild sedative that works well for similar species (administered via hypospray) was able to calm her physically. I was able to heal the small cuts on her hands and bring down the fever by tapping into and influencing her body systems directly.  
  
Her song—her presence in the Force—however, remains extremely turbulent.  
  
From what I have learned from Telfien and been able to translate from the journal, Shulma was engaged in a ritual to locate her husband. The ritual resulted in intense, overwhelming visions. They seem to be continuing to overwhelm her even now. I am going to attempt to reach her mind, and perhaps together we can sort through and calm the discord.  
  
(She is taking a seat in a chair by the patient's bedside, holding her kyber crystal in one hand and resting her other hand on the patient's head.)  
  
So much chaos here, it is causing her physical pain. There are so many, many notes. They clash and jumble together, difficult to differentiate. I am having trouble touching her mind directly, there is too much noise.  
  
Though… If I focus on a particular tone… I can see accompanying images. People, places, things that may be important, but there are just too many to be taken in all at once.  
  
This one, a person, a human adolescent. Hm, interesting, if I focus on that note deeply, it becomes a full chord, even a snatch of a song—of the boy's Force presence. It’s a strong one, he is Force sensitive. Interesting, but not particularly useful to you right now, Shulma, my friend. Perhaps if I try to quiet this note. Shh, peace…  
  
It’s working. That note has faded, it is not blaring quite so loudly. If I can lower it further… Ah, good, it’s gone. Let’s try another one. Golden orbs, faceted, ah, it’s Telfien, at the edge of a grove of trees. Fade now, shh...  
  
This seems to be working, I have to touch each note, calm it, turn it down so that it fades into the Force's quiet symphony again.  
  
This may take some time. Perhaps multiple sessions of work like this.  
  
Ah, I know _this_ song. A friend I have not seen in person for many years, though I have spoken with her more recently. Ah, If your beloved is near her, Shulma, he will face danger, but he will survive just about anything. The Force protects that woman fiercely.  
  
(My mother's cousin has been quiet for over an hour now, save for occasional humming or quiet murmurs of song that I cannot hear clearly. She tends to hum like that when focused on something in the Force. Though, to be honest, I do it too, it is difficult not to sing along when the Force is filling you with songs.)  
  
(Another hour has passed.)  
  
I think I have cleared as many of the stray notes as I can right now.  
  
(She sighs. She sounds exhausted.)  
  
I believe I am beginning to hear her own song, it is not so buried anymore. Thank the Stars, the Force, and the Ashla, she is still in there. Shh, rest now, my friend.  
  
She is sleeping peacefully, now. Come, Candun, let’s let her rest. Ay, _I_ need some rest. She’s going to need some food and drink when she wakes, her body has been through a lot. Let’s go tell her friends. Oy, quit writing and move your tail, Padawan, I need a hand, or I’m going to fall over.  
  
(Notes end.)  
  
_[The other hands end here.]_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “her prophesied Last Warrior”: See the prophecy that Shulma recalls at the end of [chapter 1 of Romance among the Stones](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19965346), after Zeb nearly falls from the Warrior: “the last warrior to scale the Warrior is the last warrior of Lasan.”
> 
> “my whole being said YES and my whole being was YES”: Just a little bit of an homage to the famous words at the very end of James Joyce’s _Ulysses:_ “yes I said yes I will Yes.”


	23. Chapter 23

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, I thank **aikisenshi** for a wonderful collaboration and the gracious loan of her characters Sennah, Danyal, Candun, and the crew of the _Second Chance_. Again, I highly recommend her [Itanno Clan Series](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1139723) to all.

O Ashla, how the most painful torment blossoms from the most joyous portent!  
  
The vision shock is finally gone. When I suffered from it back on Lasan, it almost never lasted more than a day, perhaps a day and a half. This time it drew on for four days. I spent those four days in a half-conscious delirium, plagued by a jumble of visions and near-constant head pain. At least part of that time I was in the care of a healer—a healer who may have saved my life. I only know the details of what happened because the others have told me.  
  
I fell unconscious during my meditation with Telfien in the Temple of Mak-Gu-Fina, and she had to call Glockel and Rika to bring a repulsorsled to carry me back to the _Rose Evergreen._ I awoke briefly while we were in hyperspace en route back to Bonvika’s residence on Nal Hutta, long enough to write the entry just before this, but then I passed out again and was restless and delirious for hours following. Glockel told me Telfien almost never left my bedside, even doing her customary hyperspace meditations there instead of her own ammonia-filled quarters. She has some healing talent herself, it seems—Glockel says her Gand colleague has healed of her several sprains and small wounds by touch—and she apparently tried several times to use that talent to mitigate the mental torment I was suffering. But she was able to do no more than temporarily soothe my headaches or temper my fever. The real cause of the torment was threaded too deeply within my mists, as she put it, for her to be able to touch it in her usual way.  
  
Meanwhile, I was getting worse, slipping deeper and deeper into feverish oblivion and barely responding to outside stimuli. I’m told I was constantly calling my husband’s name and alternately mumbling and shouting various strings of words no one else could understand, probably words in my own language. (Rika claims she recorded me on at least one occasion, though I am in no hurry to listen.) The others were not sure what to do, and they doubted there was anyone on Nal Hutta who could help me. Fortunately Telfien knew of another healer who was likely to be traveling in this part of the Outer Rim—a Ryn woman who was part of a musical troupe that had once been in residence at Bonvika’s villa, and whom Telfien said had mystical talents like mine and hers.  
  
So Glockel and Rika brought the _Rose Evergreen_ out of hyperspace near Akrit’tar in order to attempt to contact her. It took some time, but a response finally came: the Ryn healer and her band, called Alloy, were then on Dubrava. That was about five days’ hyperspace journey from us, but they agreed to rendezvous with us roughly halfway, near Aduba. In the meantime, the healer advised Telfien to continue her ministrations and try to keep me as calm as possible. We docked with their yacht, the _Second Chance,_ two days later.  
  
Most of my memories of the illness are uncertain, but I do remember the healer. Sennah was her name. She the first member of the Ryn species I had ever met—about the size of a smaller Human, but with striking orange-tawny fur all over her, a long tail with a brushlike tip, and a somewhat beaklike nose with what looked like several extra nostrils. She seemed close to me in age. The Ashla moved about her in a way I can only describe as lyrical, plangent, expressive—like a strain of distant music wafting on the mind’s ear. It was very soothing to me in my turbulent condition, and I could sense the resonance both in my focusing stone (which sat constantly on the ledge beside me) and in a dark green crystal that hung as a pendant from one of the necklaces she wore. She spent hours at a time by my side, probing gently into my currents to try to untangle them one by one, clearing away the fragmentary vision-shards that tormented me so, and knitting together the damaged spots in my consciousness. All the while she would hum or sing softly to herself in warm, soothing tones. Sometimes a younger male Ryn sat beside her, helping her or taking notes.  
  
Again, I only remember bits and pieces of what she did, though even so I could tell that it was very different from the methods used by Yhazi and Shaman Rachtilios (may the spirits hallow their memory) back on Lasan. Sometimes it hurt, and I couldn’t tell why, and I would feel my hands lashing out as if trying to swat her away—not that I meant to hurt her, of course. When that happened I could often feel a second pair of hands in my consciousness—perhaps those of her younger colleague applying a painkilling touch while she continued working. Sometimes—indeed, often—I could feel Sennah’s Ashla presence trembling, the way my hands sometimes used to shake when guiding one of Lua’s embroidery machines through a particularly intricate design. Was she, too, feeling uncertain? My species may have been new to her, just as hers was new to me. I could tell she was treating me with dignity and kindness, taking time to explain everything she was doing and why. But my mind was often too clouded and tired to understand, and I could not always detect any change in my condition.  
  
The breakthrough came on the second day of the treatment. I was particularly delirious, wracked by auras, vision fragments, sounds, sensations of combined deep pleasure and pain, and a searing headache on top of it all. Sennah was having no success quieting my currents in her usual way; she later told me that her repairs to one area of my consciousness had unexpectedly upset something in another, which apparently is a risk in this kind of healing (Yhazi had once said the same many years ago). She stopped what she was doing, told me she was going to take a brief break, and asked me to wait while she went back to the _Second Chance._  
  
She returned a few minutes later. This time a different Ryn came with her—not the young male who had been taking notes, but a male her age, with dark brown fur. She introduced him as her husband Danyal, and he carried some kind of stringed instrument: perhaps a quetarra? Sennah explained that she and Danyal were going to play and sing me a song, in hopes that it would calm my nerves before continuing with the treatment.  
  
So they did, and I had never before heard any song like it. It was a love song in one of the trade languages used by the Ryn, full of longing and tender passion and plaintive twists of harmony and melody. I was entranced as I heard their voices twining together over the chords of the quetarra. Their warm, rhapsodic sounds seemed to salve the wounds in my consciousness, the way a konculor licks its wounded paws, and they stirred up memories of my own love—how could they not? My tears flowed, but they were tears of healing and comfort, not of pain. I remember catching a very short glimpse of the others gathered outside the cabin door to listen before deep sleep overtook me. (Rika was there too, probably recording; this time I shall gladly listen.)  
  
I woke up several hours later to hear Sennah humming the same song to me. She was then able to bring the treatment to its end and declare me cured, though she counseled me to rest and to be careful in my mystical activities over the next several weeks. She had also brought with her a thermojug of some kind of fragrant tea, along with a canister of a similarly scented blend of herbs. I was dumbfounded with amazement and gratitude when she told me what this was: an herbal preparation to replace Shaman Rachtilios’s headache pastilles! After Sennah had read about them in this journal (yes, she read this journal—but I feel I can trust her to keep everything confidential), she had Telfien bring her the tin from my effects, which she then took to a colleague of hers on the _Second Chance_ to analyze the chemistry of the powdery remains. From this Sennah was able to blend various herbs from her stash to replicate the properties of the pastilles, in proportions appropriate to my physiology, and she told me I was welcome to contact her for more in the future as needed. I was so overcome that I wrapped her in a embrace, which we stayed in together for several moments.  
  
Sennah refused any kind of reward from me or my shipmates, saying that it had been enough simply to be able to use her talents to help. But Glockel and Telfien insisted on compensating her and her crew with enough fuel cells and supplies to make up for what they had used in making their detour from Dubrava to Aduba, and we all promised we would look out for any future opportunity to do a favor for the crew of the _Second Chance._  
  
So yes, I am now cured. I never thought anyone short of Shaman Rachtilios herself would have been able to restore my health after such a severe case of vision shock. I certainly never thought I would find anything like those headache pastilles of hers. But now, thanks to Sennah, I have both health and a new remedy. I hope some day I shall be able to see her again and properly express my gratitude. For now, I can at least rest in the joy of my recent vision without the pain.  
  
And there is the realspace siren. Soon we shall be docking on Nal Hutta.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Akrit’tar, Dubrava, and Aduba are all established planets at the “east” end of the SW galaxy, at various points between Hutt Space and the Centrality.)
> 
> The [quetarra](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Quetarra) is simply an established SW equivalent of the guitar. ( **aikisenshi** has been referring to Danyal’s instrument as a guitar, but I thought it likely that Shulma might mix it up with the other.)
> 
> Sennah and Danyal’s song: I imagine it being very similar (read: pretty much identical with :p ) the traditional Sephardic song “La rosa enflorece.” Because there are so many recordings of this song and it’s hard to choose just one, here are a few that I particularly enjoyed:  
> [Dafné Kritharas and Paul Barreyre (two voices, guitar, percussion)](https://youtu.be/Em4YnD9w86o)  
> [Zoltán Arany (with guitar, percussion, and various other instruments)](https://youtu.be/5WokdenoUd8)  
> [Esther Lamandier (with harp)](https://youtu.be/cP1LdTat5oU)  
> [Winsome Evans and the Renaissance Players (voice, harp, and I think some kind of mandolin or lute too)](https://youtu.be/XOyFl4uyE9A). Note especially the vocal duet that starts around 3:02.
> 
> Sennah’s herbal preparation to replace the headache pastilles was the suggestion of **aikisenshi**. What an Ashlasend for Shulma—how could I not include it? Thanks again!


	24. Chapter 24

And, once again, Shulma Trilasha Orrelios finds herself adjusting to life on a new world. (And apparently picking up Gand speech habits too, _ai rrhu’ kh’Ashla!_ )  
  
Almost nothing here is what I expected. Bonvika’s villa is certainly not what I would have expected from a Hutt’s stronghold. It is located in the meadowland region outside the town of Gebroila—a pleasant, verdant country of flower-studded hills and sun-sparkling lakes. The villa itself houses not only Bonvika’s own living quarters and those of her close associates, but also a Great Hall, an art gallery, two recital halls (one larger and one more intimate), and a small collection of rare books. Elsewhere on the grounds are hangars, high-security storage facilities, and of course the docking bay where we arrived. The surrounding grounds are vast and breathtakingly lovely, full of lush tree groves and finely manicured gardens that rival the Royal Lasat Display Gardens themselves. I never realized the Hutt homeworld had such a place, though perhaps that shows how little I know of the Hutt homeworld.   
  
Then there is Bonvika herself. She is nothing like what I would have expected from a Hutt. Besides G.’s Gran Adelgund, I don’t know when I’ve ever met anyone so… effusively cordial, shall I say. Bonvika welcomed us personally at the docking bay, congratulating us effusively on our successes in the Kanson-Wiss sector, while Rika and a pair of security droids took the Khorassani festival jewels directly to one of the secure storage facilities. When Telfien and Glockel introduced me and Lua, Bonvika exclaimed how _mahvelous_ it was to meet us (it seems Hutts, too, have trouble with their _resh_ es). She was full of questions about our experiences on our homeworlds and on Svivren, and once we returned to her main audience chamber at the villa she invited us to sit beside her on the cushions of her dais as we conversed with her. (Though I must say, whatever fragrance she was wearing smelled a little too much like kamphra water.) At one point Lua complimented Bonvika on the beauty of the cushions and on the upholstery around the villa in general, which led to a lengthy and enthusiastic conversation between the two of them about textiles, upholstery, drapery styles, and the like. I was just as glad simply to be able to finish my tea in peace.  
  
And oh yes, it’s always “dahling” with Bonvika. Everyone is “dahling,” from me to Lua to the serving droids. I wonder how G. would take such an appellation, were he here. No, rather, I _know_ how he would...  
  
Later, Bonvika’s majordomo, a Theelin named Diva Marquisha, took us on a tour of the grounds and the villa. Bonvika has allowed us pretty much the run of the place, with the obvious exception of the secure areas that are locked off to everyone. In the evening we enjoyed a luxurious dinner of Lebnan delicacies in the Great Hall, with live musicians performing from the minstrels’ gallery—no detail is lacking here, it seems. Marquisha conducted us to our quarters afterward. The lodging I have been given is only slightly larger than what I occupied on Svivren, but it is much more comfortable and by far more nicely furnished.   
  
Tomorrow I shall take a closer look at the library. I need to return to my work on the sacred writings, and that seems like the ideal place to do so.

* * *

The library is lovely. It is quite small, more of a reading room than a library; it lies at the far west end of the villa and commands a fine view of the gardens. I brought my notebooks there this morning and I began some jottings on the Seventh and Eighth Tractates; the seventh is so short, and so closely related to the eighth, that it seems sensible to work on them together. All was perfectly, blessedly quiet while I worked, with no noise besides the low whir of the page droid going about its business.  
  
But here is perhaps the most incredible thing of all about Bonvika’s library. I happened in an idle moment to be combing the catalog of manuscripts, and one particular entry caught my eye: _Osthi’khu llagrriai komp’ahd_ (something along the lines of “Osthi’s tears compendium”). It would have been astonishing enough to see an entry in my native language, let alone one naming of one of our greatest prophetesses. I immediately entered its shelf number into the computer terminal, and some minutes later the page droid brought it out to me. It was indeed written in the Old Lasat of the High Prophetic era—but even more astonishing was the handwriting, which did indeed look very similar to the handwriting I had seen years before in manuscripts in the Academy of Shamans known to have been penned by Osthi herself. I had the droid place it on a hold shelf for me so I can study it more closely tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gebroila: <http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Gebroila>  
>   
> Adelgund is the name **Raissa_Baiard** has given [http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Garazeb_Orrelios's_grandmother](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Garazeb_Orrelios%27s_grandmother).  
>   
> Hutt Lebnan food is the creation of **Chyntuck** and is based on various Middle Eastern cuisines here on Earth. See her post about it [here](https://boards.theforce.net/posts/52279024).


	25. Chapter 25

After a bit of work on the middle chapters of the Eighth, I took a further look at this _Osthi’khuu llagrriai komp’ahd._ It is indeed in the hand of Osthi of Feldspar Falls; I remember it distinctly from my days at the academy, and she signs it, in very small writing, at the very bottom of the last page. It seems to have two main layers. The earlier one, which is the longer of the two, seems to be Osthi’s own handwritten copy of Berura’s _Flowing Lightnings,_ including her own annotations. A truly remarkable find in itself (and one that may save me a bit of work once I move on in earnest to the Greater and Lesser Seers). But the second layer seems even more interesting, because I cannot tell what it is yet. It is titled _Shining Tears for the Absent One_ and seems to be cast in a highly poetic register, much like that of the more lyrical passages in the _Stronghold of Prophecy_ (I still have Chava’s excellent edition with me, of course).  
  
O radiant Ashla, have I stumbled on a previously unknown work by Lasan’s most sublime seer?  
  
Mustn’t become too distracted, however. I still must finish the Eighth Tractate and at least begin on the Greater Seers before I begin delving in earnest into this new find.

* * *

Today I heard a lovely noonday concert in the smaller recital hall: Kiffar tenor Elsaak Konshi, a recent recipient of the GYORM Scholarship. (That stands for Gifted Young Outer-Rim Musicians, but I believe there was a mining village in the Basalt Mountains called that, too.) He sang a variety of pieces from the Coreworld art-song repertoire; particularly exquisite were the _Eskari Songs,_ opus 66, by Lorne Bel Fiora. Regrettably, however, the two adolescent girls sitting in front of me spent the entire time giggling and whispering. (One was the spitting image of the Theelin majordomo: her daughter?)  
  
I stayed at the library late into the evening at the library working on the Seventh and Eighth. But _Osthi’khuu llagrriai komp’ahd_ is still sitting there on my hold shelf waiting for me, beckoning to me. Soon, beloved prophetess, soon...

* * *

Finally on to Osthi! I simply could not help myself; I dove right into the _Shining Tears_ portion of the manuscript a week ago last Primeday, and it is so breathtakingly lovely that I have almost not wanted to work on anything else since then. It takes the form of an extended vision or series of visions, all written in the voice of the Seer (the Fourth that Osthi adds to the Three), and it describes the Seer’s search for the Child of Lasan—a search alluded to several times in the _Stronghold of Prophecy_ but never fully elaborated on there.  
  
And what a search it is, so full of pathos and beauty and longing! At various points throughout her journey, the Seer is forcibly displaced, kidnapped, assaulted (fortunately without major effects, thank the Ashla!), spurned by those around her, and left to mourn the Child’s loss in solitude—  
  
O Ashla, is it presumptuous of me to see my own plights and wanderings in those of your divine Seer? Surely my own meager trials cannot possibly compare to hers. But at very least I know those solitary tears...  
  
But the Seer does not truly weep in solitude. The Ashla stays always beside her—and here is what gives the work its name: the Ashla catches and preserves each of the tears she sheds, infusing each of them with its own light, then sends them out into the universe as grains of stardust or tiny star-beacons to illumine the night and guide the Child back to the Seer’s side. Oh, how fervently the Seer prays for that day, for when they finally stand together on the high places, all those fiery tear-sparks shall reunite to shine forth brighter than the light of all the star clusters—  
  
That is as far as I’ve read, and now my own poor tears are flowing again. If only they could have such power…!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lorne Bel Fiora and his _Eskari Songs,_ opus 66, were first created for my story [Opus Sixty-Six](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12577216). In that story, the main characters perform only one song from the cycle.  
>   
> Elsaak Konshi: Named after Belgian tenor [Jan van Elsacker](http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Bio/Elsacker-Jan-van.htm). Konshi is an established Kiffar clan (<http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Clan_Konshi>).


	26. Chapter 26

Has it really been a year since I arrived at Bonvika’s? The Ashla is truly marvelous and mysterious in its workings: never would I have guessed to find such a pleasant, peaceful haven at the court of a Hutt. I really could not have asked for a better place to devote myself to restoring my people’s ancient lore—not to mention the completely unexpected finding of Osthi’s _Shining Tears for the Absent One,_ which now is fully transcribed, more than halfway translated, and under contract with Khorassograd University Press. And I am really and truly among friends: Bonvika continues to be a gracious host, Telfien and I still meditate together, Glockel and I play the occasional game of dejarik, and Lua and I go on walks through the garden. (She, incidentally, has been hard at work of late repairing the ancient Rakatan tapestries in the Great Hall.)  
  
My morning was spent in the library, working on the translation, Osthi’s annotations on Berura (which are themselves almost as poetic as Berura’s own words), and some of the other Lesser Seers. Afterward I walked with Lua as usual. She is over all five of this world’s moons with sheer joy: Bonvika is so pleased with her work on the tapestries that she has formally engaged her to design and craft all-new upholstery for the entire second floor of the villa. Draperies, cushions, throws, wall hangings, everything—it will be the biggest job of its kind that she has ever had in her seamstress career, and the sort of commission she has always dreamed of but never actually received, either on Pipada or on Svivren.  
  
As she puts it: “Dresses and suits FINE and all, but NOTHING make me so HAPPY as a GOOD smooth-welted SLIPCOVER!” I shall take her word for it. When I was working in her shop on Svivren, I must say I personally found the dresses and suits easier.

* * *

Yes, I have been here a year now. And yet I cannot rid myself of the nagging, nudging feeling—the intuition, Telfien would call it—that the Ashla needs me to do more than sit here with my notebooks and ancient manuscripts in this peaceful haven. If my Zeblove is still out there somewhere (and I pray continually that that is still the case), I must search for him.  
  
So, whenever I can, I go out on runs with the _Rose Evergreen._ I enjoy accompanying Glockel, Telfien, and Rika on their missions, and when I do I keep my senses open for anything I might learn about that alliance or rebellion that Lua told me of, on the off-chance (and I know that it is very much an off-chance) that this might reveal something about G.’s whereabouts. (I have no hard evidence that my G. is in fact connected with the same rebellion as Pao is—that too is solely an _intuition_ at present.) I have found nothing so far, but I have not given up.  
  
The next run will be in just a few days. I have been helping with various preparatory tasks, which has proven a welcome respite from squinting at Osthi’s scrawly marginalia. Today, besides cleaning the ’fresher, I assisted in moving several crates from the secure storage units on board. There is barely room for a dust mite in the cargo hold now, and not much more than that in the rear storage cabin.  
  
It seems their next destination is Mazhar, along the Hydian Way (or so Glockel says). This time Lua will be going as well, because whatever is in all those storage crates is apparently going to be traded for the textiles she needs for Bonvika’s second floor. When Glockel invited me along, she teased that it would be useful for her and the others to have someone “big and tough” with them in order to “aid in negotiations.” If they say so—I suppose I must come to terms with the fact that many Human-sized species will persist in viewing me that way.  
  
I shall bring my notes and scans of the Berura annotations. It will be nice to have some non-galactic-tiles activities with which to occupy myself during the long hyperspace journey.

* * *

Our journey was quiet and uneventful. We arrived on Mazhar in good time, docking directly at the capital city’s largest textiles and furnishings depot. I saw what Glockel meant about “big and tough” once we met our contacts: a gigantic male Karkarodon with an equally gigantic voice, who had two hulking Cathar assistants and a security guard that might have been one of those Niordi living weapons. While Lua, with occasional assistance from Glockel and Telfien, conducted the terms of sale (and it was quite something to see the slight, unassuming Drabatan woman stride up to the Karkarodon and tell him exactly how many meters of double-weave embroidered damasq she needed for the cushions in the Upper Parlor), I knit my brows and put on my husband’s roughest, toughest facial expression. I don’t know how convincing it was in conjunction with my embroidered crushed-velvoid cloak (another one of Lua’s creations), though what finally got the message across were the Ashla sparks that I made sure would fly from my cracked knuckles at a particularly challenging moment in the negotiations. Needless to say, the Karkarodon gave Lua exactly what she wanted at exactly the right prices, and threw in a few extra bolts as well.  
  
  
We stayed an extra few days to visit the court of Embra the Hutt, a close friend and associate of Bonvika’s who is based on Mazhar. Glockel insisted that he too was “not like most other Hutts”—which almost makes me wonder (and I stress “almost”) what “most other Hutts” are actually like. This one treated us very kindly, however, and he is certainly of a much mellower temperament than Bonvika. Glockel and Telfien gave him news from Bonvika’s villa and introduced me. He expressed his sympathy and outrage over what the Empire had done on my homeworld and others, adding that he has been trying for years (though without success) to persuade the Hutt Cartel and the Ruling Council of Nal Hutta to condemn the Empire officially.  
  
Hoping to find out something about the larger rebellion, I asked Embra if he knew of any movements that were fighting the Empire. He said he didn’t know of any beyond a small group of guerrilla fighters on Nar Shaddaa that was resisting local Imperial authority—Jade’s Irregulars, they called themselves—and he added that he didn’t see how anything larger than that could form anywhere, given the Empire’s tight grip. (I noticed that Lua was about to say something, but she immediately checked herself.)  
  
He also spoke privately with Telfien for a long time—“about various other Gand that he knew,” she later said. As usual, I could tell nothing from her expression or tone of voice.  
  
So, still nothing. I don’t really know if it will do me any good at all to follow this rebellion lead; it’s all I have, and in a way it’s not much. But sooner shall the Galaxy halt in its spin than I give up the search for you, my mighty bristlecone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Embra the Hutt](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Embra) Has always seemed like one of the more sympathetic Hutts in Legends lore; he goes on to found the Hutt Resistance that aids the Republic against the Yuuzhan Vong, I thought he would make a good ally for Bonvika and that he might have anti-Imperial sentiments as well. Mazhar is indeed established to be his base of operations. (He also has connections to Zuckuss, hence the remark about “various other Gand that he knew”: he hires Zuckuss as part of his team to search for the Yavin Vassilika in the _Star Wars: Underworld_ comics.  
>   
> Jade’s Irregulars: This Jade is **Raissa_Baiard** ’s OC Domnic Jade, later known as Doran Blayne, and the hero of her seminal story [Everyone Comes to Doran’s Place](https://boards.theforce.net/threads/everyone-comes-to-dorans-place-oc-repost.50020957/). The story mentions that Nar Shaddaa was one of the places Doran settled, along with a group of fellow post-Order-66 Jedi refugees, in the years before he came to Merkesh toopen the Café Alderaan. Although that was a generation or so before this story takes place, I imagine the members of this rebel cell as being Doran’s ideological descendants, in a way, and I thought itwould be fun to work in an homage to a good friend and admired fellow writer.


	27. Chapter 27

_[NB. Several blank pages intervene between the previous entry and this one, which a chemdating scan reveals to have been written almost five years later. The events of the intervening years are undoubtedly chronicled in other sources.]_  
  
I just found this old journal of mine, wedged between my bed and the wall. I do not think that it is coincidence that I found it today and felt an urge to write in it. The Ashla knows no coincidences.  
  
Ah, the Ashla—is it still with me? Is it still there beside me, catching and preserving my tears, as Osthi writes? Perhaps so, but it feels like a stranger now: distant, dark, turbid, uncertain. All the violence and upheaval in the Galaxy (the Empire, curse it to the Bogan’s pit, tightens its grip daily) has become violence and upheaval within _you,_ spirit of the universe…  
  
Passing the second-floor communications suite the other day, I heard Lua on a comm call with her son. She was shaking as she emerged; I embraced her as she told me of it. Pao is mobilized—mobilized against his commanders’ orders, and at immense risk, though he insists he and his companions must take that risk if there is to be any hope of defeating the Empire for good and all. He could not tell her what that risk was.   
  
“Sa’Kalla,” I whispered to her, and she whispered the same back.  
  
May the four protecting cloaks of the Ashla be upon him and all who go with him!

* * *

_[The next entry seems to date from some weeks later.]_  
  
Today is the solstice. I have just come in from the Naboo Formal Garden, where I tried to perform the Storm Solstice ritual, as I do each year. I say tried, because I did not complete it. I intoned all the invocations as usual; I held my staff and my stone to the light as usual; I opened my mind and self to the Ashla as usual. But the light itself felt wrong: bleak, white, and cold instead of golden, fiery, and warm. My throat felt clamped, choked, so that I could not chant at full voice. I felt tears on my cheeks.  
  
And just as I reached the climax of the invocation— _i-ai rrhu’kh’aa,_ I can barely describe what happened. It was as if everything exploded—not in the sublime golden sunburst of Lira San but in flares of white-hot death—and suddenly I heard a horrible, bloodcurdling sound like a trillion screams—cut short by SILENCE and DARKNESS—  
  
I must have been unconscious. I came to in the middle of the lawn in a cold, trembling sweat and with a piercing headache; no one was about. Somehow I lifted myself to my feet and hurried back through the gardens, through the villa complex to my rooms to collapse on my bed. My journal was lying there, and again I felt the urge to write in it and have now done so—but the pain has returned to my head and vision shock is beginning to claim me once again...   
  
Where are you my Ashla where are you my love my own

* * *

Alderaan. It was Alderaan.  
  
Glockel came in and told me (she and Marquisha have been checking on me). Alderaan, most peaceful and beautiful of the Core Worlds, the world that created the painting outside the Naboo formal garden—O Ashla, my currents lurch so much I can barely write it. Not conquered or ravaged or neutralized like Lasan: _destroyed._ All of it, from crust to core. All that dwell on it and in it—  
  
O merciful spirit of the universe, how can such things be possible—and yet I _know_ how—  
  
It affected Telfien too. Glockel says that she passed out during a meditation that same day, and that since then her entire body has shut down into a dormant state that looks almost like death—“I’ve seen her do it before,” the Human hastened to reassure me, and it is apparently one way her species is known to respond to extreme stress. Glockel and Marquisha have been checking on her as well, though there is not much they can do for her in that state. As soon as I am strong enough I shall go to her.

* * *

My currents are somewhat calmer now. I checked on Telfien yesterday and earlier this morning. She is conscious again and has been meditating on various smaller questions, riddles, or exercises to try to calm herself, but I can tell it has not gone smoothly for her; the Ashla still shudders and shivers in its flow around her, too. I offered to meditate with her, since two mystical consciousnesses can so often navigate stormy currents better than one. She agreed, but immediately wondered what questions I would be meditating on during our session. None, I told her—I would simply be channeling the Ashla toward her so that it could restore light and balance to her mystical senses. (As it happens, the Findsmen do not classify that process as meditation proper; they call it “invoking the stillness of the fog.”)  
  
So we meditated—or invoked the stillness of the fog—together in the Gray Drawing Room. I began by following what I remembered of the centering rituals from the _Book of the Four Protecting Cloaks_ (next on my list of scriptures to record, as it turns out), the very rituals my dear friends Rishla and Yhazi used long ago on Lasan to still my own mystic torments.  
  
But as the meditation went on, I found I was able to do for Telfien exactly what the Ryn healer Sennah had done for me when she healed me of vision shock some years ago: isolate each troubling thought, each frightening vision, and quiet it by touching it, the same way one would damp a vibrating chime. There were so many, and it took a long time: ship after ship, moon after moon, world after world going up in the same white-hot blaze I had seen. And that now-almost-familiar pair of cold silver compound eyes, first suddenly extinguished, then reappearing, then being extinguished, then reappearing, again and again…  
  
It took time, but my friend’s calm was finally restored, thanks be to the Sacred Light—and along the way I found much calm of my own. May it never leave me. May it never leave any of us, no matter what happens.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pao’s mobilization relates to the events of _Rogue One,_ of course.  
>   
> “a dormant state that looks almost like death”: See <https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Gand/Legends> under “Biology and Appearance.” Telfien does the same thing toward the end of [Between the Porch and the Altar](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24664576). That is before she begins traveling with Glockel, but at this point it’s likely that Glockel has seen Telfien do this before at other times.  
>   
>  _Book of the Four Protecting Cloaks:_ Fanon. First mentioned in [Calm after the Storm](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15844134) as the source of the tandem calming ritual Yhazi and Rishla perform on Shulma.  
>   
> Again, many thanks to **aikisenshi** for letting me bring Sennah into this story.


	28. Chapter 28

O Ashla, spirit of mercy, preserver of my tears! What news I have heard: news that brings joy, relief, and gloom all at once to my heart.  
  
I have just come from Bonvika’s main audience chamber, where we were all watching the latest breaking holonet news report. There _is_ a Rebel Alliance. They have just won a decisive victory against the Empire in the Yavin system, where they routed the Imperial fleet and destroyed an entire battle station (rumored to be the one that destroyed Alderaan). The system’s fourth planet was their base of operations, it turned out, and they showed a picture of it: I gasped as I recognized the two pyramidal towers that I had seen in that vision so long ago, full of beings waving happily. They were not so full of beings this time, but my heart pounded all the same: was my love there? Was Lua’s son Pao? (And—admittedly a long shot—what about Telfien’s old friend with the silver eyes?)  
  
My first thought was to urge that the _Rose Evergreen_ be made ready and that we go there immediately. But we cannot. Already the Empire has begun blockading the system. It would be too great a risk; the _Rose Evergreen_ is a small ship, barely more than a starfighter (but I won’t let Glockel see me write that).  
  
O spirits, why? Why do you snatch from me this one chance to find my love, to learn for certain of his fate? And I feel for Lua, too: will she be able to reunite with her son? I do not know if my Zeblove ever was at the base on Yavin—I never really did—but certainly Pao was? Or is? I suppose it was never more than an inkling, a wisp of a guess, based on one fleeting vision long ago…  
  
But my heart rejoices that the Empire’s power has been broken, at least for now. May no other world in the Galaxy ever know the sufferings of Lasan, Pipada, and Alderaan.

* * *

Now, much sooner than expected, we have news of Pao—and it is the news we have all been dreading.  
  
Lua received the transmission this morning, from one General Draven of the Rebel Alliance; I was with her at the comm suite. Her brave son, her freedom fighter, gave his life in battle. Not at Yavin itself, but in the earlier mission she had told me about, the one made against his commanders’ orders. All fifteen of his comrades perished on that mission as well.  
  
Poor, dear Lua! How stiff and pale she turned from pure shock! She did not seem to hear the rest of the general’s words: that the victory at Yavin would not have been possible without their sacrifice, that the Alliance would always remember their courage. I held her a long time; I don’t know how long. For several moments she was silent, unable to utter a sound from pure grief, until finally she began a low, monotone keen—tones and words of lament in her native language, so plaintive that they needed no translation.  
  
Very quietly, under my breath, I joined my voice to hers, chanting the Consecration of the Fallen.

* * *

G. beside me as I got up.  
  
And again at breakfast.  
  
And again, after I finished morning rituals, smiling one of his smiles… I could barely look.  
  
And my Zeblove again at evening tea. Sovereign Ashla, what is happening? And why now, why again, amid so much sadness…?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> General Draven: <https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Davits_Draven>  
>   
> “All fifteen of his comrades”: Per the Wookieepedia page (<https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Rogue_One_(squad)>), there seem to have been a total of sixteen members of the Rogue One expedition.  
>   
> “so plaintive that they needed no translation”: The lore describes Drabatan love songs this way (see <http://swbloodlines.wikia.com/wiki/Drabatan>; note that this isn’t Wookieepedia), so I thought it likely that their laments might be similar.  
>   
> Consecration of the Fallen: See [chapter 4](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25337692/chapters/61784470).


	29. Chapter 29

I am in the library now, at my favorite table beside the window, with my notes on the _Book of the Four Protecting Cloaks_ before me. It is just dawn. The gardens are truly a glorious sight in the morning twilight, with all the leaves and flowers passing through dim purple to fiery red and then to lambent gold as the sun mounts in the sky. I see them and recall how the cliffs and wildflowers around Mount Straga went through the same lovely transformation each morning, and how their rebirth was my own.  
  
As it still is. The Ashla is the sun that never sets. Truly its infinite fiery sparks are renewed with every dawn, and its light transfigures us all, wheresoever we may be, howsoever much we have lost.  
  
And how active that light is this morning, as I turn and see my own smiling warrior-love sitting beside me—and then disappearing again...  
  
Ah, well, time to get to work.

* * *

A holomessage cube was waiting for me in my quarters when I returned there. It was from Culture Minister Ardyse Goldfleck-Straz of Khorassan, of all beings, and I had to read it twice to make sure I hadn’t mistaken or misunderstood. She has invited me to take the role of the Veiled Queen at this year’s Days of Love and Light! Oddly, the datestamp of the cube is from almost four months ago; it must have fallen victim to the transmissions delays that the war has been causing throughout the Galaxy. But I am lucky it arrived when it did, for the festival is in only two weeks’ time.   
  
Ah, I am staggered! This is an immense and unique honor, and Minister Goldfleck-Straz is so thoughtful to remember me after all this time. But I do not know if I will be able to accept. The date is so close, and the hyperspace journey from Nal Hutta to Khorassan is a substantial one. Besides, it feels strange—wrong, even!—to be thinking of festivals at a time like this, with the war still raging and with Lua’s loss hanging so newly over us.  
  
I must think on it further. But I cannot take much longer: my response is required by tomorrow. Should I ask for advice? The message warns me to be very careful in whom I confide, for the identity of the queen is to remain a secret. Perhaps Telfien, once she is finished with her morning meditations. But that will not be for several hours.  
  
O Ashla, guide me…!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “its infinite fiery sparks are renewed with every dawn”: a paraphrase from a verse of the eleventh-century Hebrew _piyyut_ (paraliturgical poem) “U-ve-khein namlikhekha,” recited during the Rosh Hashanah morning liturgy: “All the fiery sparks are renewed each morning: the Lord reigns!”


	30. Chapter 30

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As I post this last chapter of _Shaman, Traveler, Oracle,_ I wish once again to thank [Raissa_Baiard](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raissa_Baiard/pseuds/Raissa_Baiard) for her friendship, support, keen-eyed beta-reading, and a wonderful collaboration on the shared Lasat ocedarium and fanon lore that forms the heart of this and my other Lasat stories; to [Kahara_the_Ghostly_Galoomp](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kahara_the_Ghostly_Galoomp/pseuds/Kahara_the_Ghostly_Galoomp) for her support and friendship as well, and for filling in on beta reading when Raissa was unavailable; to [aikisenshi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aikisenshi/) for an amazing collaboration in chapters 22 and 23 and the generous loan of her awesome OCs Sennah, Danyal, and others; and, finally, to all of you readers who have followed Shulma on her journey thus far! As you shall see, her story is by no means over...

_[Here the handwriting becomes shaky, agitated, and almost illegible.]_  
  
MY QUEEN  
  
Oh, my head, my currents—  
  
Those were his words—that is what he said to me as he stood in the doorway of my bed alcove, extending his strong arms toward me, before he disappeared (as always)—  
  
MY QUEEN oh that was what he called me on our wedding evening, too—  
  
O Ashla O sovereign spirit of the universe I need not ask for advice for I understand now—  
  
I must go. _I must go!_  
  
Because that is where I will find him: not on Yavin but on Khorassan, at the festival, in the temple. The temple where I first learned, after years of exile, pain, and loss, that my Zeblove was _not_ lost. The temple where I shall don the veil and jewels of the Queen of Love and Light. (The decoy jewels, of course. The real ones will stay safely here, in secure storage, until the threat of the Empire is past for good.)  
  
And there I will once again be _your queen,_ my mighty bristlecone, my Garazeb!  
  
I must find Telfien and Glockel and Rika at once. We must go.

* * *

* * *

* * *

* * *

* * *

* * *

_[My mother’s journal ends here. I have yet to locate the full, detailed account of her second visit to Khorassan, and her reunion with my father, though she has already told me some of that remarkable story. For the time being, at least, I offer this work as a labor of deep love and honor for an extraordinary daughter of Lasan, and I commend it to the Ashla of all being, now and forever. —Ch. Y. O.]_

**fin**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> But wait! The story's not over yet... it continues in [Stand Together on the High Places](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26912101/chapters/65672482).


End file.
